Saturday, October 26, 2024

The Our Father as Explained by Our Lord – Revelations to Luisa Piccarreta, Part Two.


It is true that the Church has been reciting the ‘Our Father’ from the time I came upon earth, in which one asks, ‘Thy Kingdom come’, so that my Will be done on earth as It is in Heaven, but who thinks about the request they make?  It can be said that the whole importance of such a request remained in my Will and that creatures recite it just to recite it, without understanding and without any interest in obtaining what they ask for.


It is true that everything that the creature does is my grace, but my grace itself wants to find the prop of the dispositions and good will of the creature. Therefore, in order to restore the Kingdom of my Will upon earth it takes sufficient acts of the creature, so that my Kingdom may not remain in the air, but may descend, to be formed upon the very acts of the creature formed by her to obtain a good so great. Therefore, if you want It, continue your acts, so that, by reaching the established number, you may obtain what you long for with so much insistence.”


Then, I [Luisa] was thinking to myself:  “In the ‘Our Father,’ Our Lord teaches us to say—to pray: ‘Your Will be done.’  Now, why does He say that He wants us to live in It?” And Jesus, always benign, moving in my interior, told me:  “My daughter, ‘Your Will be done’ that I taught in the ‘Our Father’ meant that all were to pray that they might at least do the Will of God.  And this is for all Christians and for all times; nor can anyone call himself a Christian if he does not dispose himself to do the Will of his Celestial Father. But you have not thought of the other addition that comes immediately after:  ‘On earth as It is in Heaven.’ ‘On earth as It is in Heaven’ means to live in the Divine Will; it means to pray that the Kingdom of My Will may come on earth in order to live in It.


In Heaven, they not only do My Will, but they live in It—they possess It as their own thing, and as their own Kingdom.  To do the Will of God does not mean to possess It, but to submit oneself to Its commands, while to live in It is possession.  Therefore, in the ‘Our Father’, in the words ‘Your Will be done’ is the prayer that all may do the Supreme Will, and in ‘on earth as It is in Heaven,’ that man may return into that Will from which he came, in order to reacquire his happiness, the lost goods, and the possession of his Divine Kingdom.”


Then I [Luisa] continued my acts in the Divine Fiat, and I offered everything in order to obtain Its Kingdom upon earth.  I wanted to invest the whole Creation, animate all created things with my voice, so that all of them might say, together with me: “Fiat Voluntas Tua on earth as It is in Heaven.  Hurry, hurry—let Your Kingdom come.”But while doing this, I thought to myself: “How can this Kingdom so holy come upon earth?  In creatures there is no change; no one occupies himself with It; sin and passions abound.  How, then, can this Kingdom ever come upon earth?”


So, while I was thinking about the Kingdom of the Divine Will, and Its reigning upon earth seemed as though difficult to me, my Beloved Jesus, coming out from within my interior, told me:  “My daughter, as Adam sinned, God made him the promise of the future Redeemer.  Centuries passed, but the promise did not fail, and the generations had the good of Redemption.  Now, as I came from Heaven and formed the Kingdom of Redemption, before departing for Heaven, I made another promise, more solemn, of the Kingdom of My Will; and this was in the ‘Our Father.’


And so as to give it more value, and to obtain It more quickly, I made this formal promise in the solemnity of My prayer, praying the Father to let His Kingdom come, which is the Divine Will on earth as It is in Heaven.  I placed My very Self at the head of this prayer, knowing that such was His Will, and that, prayed by Me, He would deny Me nothing; more so, since I prayed with His very Will, and I asked for something that was wanted by My Father Himself.


And after I had formed this prayer before My Celestial Father, certain that the Kingdom of My Divine Will upon earth would be granted to Me, I taught it to My Apostles, that they might teach it to the whole world, so that one might be the cry of all:  ‘Your Will be done, on earth as It is in Heaven.’  A promise more sure and solemn I could not make.  Centuries are like one single point for Us, but Our words are accomplished acts and facts.

 



My very praying to the Celestial Father: ‘Let It come—let Your Kingdom come; Your Will be done on earth as It is in Heaven,’ meant that with My coming upon earth the Kingdom of My Will was not established in the midst of creatures; otherwise I would have said:  ‘My Father, let Our Kingdom, that I have already established on earth, be confirmed, and let Our Will dominate and reign.’  Instead, I said:  ‘Let It come.’  This meant that It must come, and creatures must await It with that certainty with which they awaited the future Redeemer, because there is My Divine Will, bound and committed, in those words of the ‘Our Father’; and when It binds Itself, whatever It promises is more than certain.  More so, since everything was prepared by Me; nothing else was needed but the manifestation of My Kingdom—and this I am doing.


Do you think that My giving you so many truths about My Fiat is only to give you simple news?  No, no; it is because I want everyone to know that Its Kingdom is near, and to know Its beautiful prerogatives, so that all may love—may yearn to enter, to live in a Kingdom so holy, full of happiness and of all goods. Therefore, what seems difficult to you is easy for the power of Our Fiat, because It knows how to remove all difficulties, and to conquer everything—the way It wants, and when It wants.”


My daughter, God is order, and when He wants to give a good to creatures, He always places His Divine order in it, and everything that is done in order to obtain a good so great begins from God, as He places Himself at the head of it to take on the commitment, and then orders the creature for the same purpose.


I did this in order to give, Myself, the Redemption, and so that creatures might receive It; and I am doing this, Myself, to give the Kingdom of the Divine Fiat, and so that creatures may receive It. By forming, Myself, the ‘Our Father,’ I placed Myself at the head of it and took on the commitment to give this Kingdom; and by teaching it to My Apostles, I placed in the creatures the order of how to be able to obtain a good so great.  So, the whole Church is praying—there is not one soul who belongs to Her that does not recite the ‘Our Father.’


And even though many recite it without interest in wanting and asking for a Kingdom so holy—that the Divine Will be done on earth as It is in Heaven—since the interest is in He who taught it, by their reciting it, My interest is renewed, and I hear My own prayer asking:  ‘May Your Kingdom come, so that Your Will be done on earth as It is in Heaven.’  However, if the creature, in reciting the ‘Our Father,’ had this interest of wanting and longing for My Kingdom, she would take part in My own interest, and her will would be fused in Mine for the same purpose.  But, regardless of this, My Will and interest always run in each ‘Our Father.’


See then, the Divine order:  all asking for one thing.  Among these who ask there are some who want to do My Will, others who do It.  All this is braided together, and they knock at the doors of My Divine Will—they repeat the knocking, and some knock strongly, some slowly.  However, there is always someone who knocks and asks that the doors be opened, so that My Will may descend to reign upon earth.”


Based on the revelations of Jesus to Luisa Piccarreta recorded in The Book of Heaven.

Volume 19, September 13, 1926; Volume 20, October 15, 1926; Volume 21, November 27, 1927; Volume 24, May 26, 1928.


View my Catholic books on Luisa and others Here.

 

 

Friday, October 18, 2024

Proof of Authenticity.

Maria Valtorta’s The Gospel as Revealed to Me mentions 255 geographical sites in Palestine, of which 79 were completely unknown to archaeologists and biblical scholars in the mid-1940’s when she wrote her work. Since then, of the 79 unknown sites, at least 29 have now been confirmed as actually existing in first century Palestine, including six ancient cities that she described. How could she have known about these places? [Probably more have been confirmed, since the below article was written in 2004.]


Proof of Authenticity. Research done by David J. Webster M.Div. 11/15/04.


Maria Valtorta was an eye-witness to the first century life and ministry of Our Lord Jesus! Her numerous strikingly accurate descriptions of first century Palestine Prove it!

 

While it may be difficult for some to grasp, “in the spirit” where all time is one, one can, if allowed by providence, literally see any event in history as it actually takes place. That Maria Valtorta’s revelations are literally packed with strikingly accurate descriptions of first century Palestine reveals that what she saw was the very life and ministry of our Lord.


This would mean that The Gospel as Revealed to Me is not the product of mere pious imagination as seems at least partly true with other revelations of biblical persons and times. Over thirty percent or 79 of the 255 geographical sites in Palestine mentioned in her work were not listed in the 1939 International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (ISBE) Atlas. 62 of these 79 were not even listed in the 184 page Macmillan Bible Atlas (MBA) published in 1968.


Where did Maria Valtorta get all these names? For a first century eye-witness to include so many obscure and unknown names would, of course, be expected. And most surprising is that these names, obscure and unknown in the 1940’s, are being proven authentic. 52 of these 62 have no biblical reference whatever and 17 of these with no biblical reference have been either indirectly confirmed as authentic by recent “ancient external sources” found in the Macmillan Bible Atlas (1968) or actually listed in the HarperCollins Atlas of the Bible (1989). This makes a total of 29 confirmations since the 1939 ISBE atlas listing.


Also among those 62 sites are mentioned the ruins of 6 ancient Palestinian cities, some corresponding to the modern consensus on location.


In addition, Valtorta’s precise descriptions of the natural topography of Palestine from numerous locations and the information about the outside pagan world of that day, including people, places, customs, Greek and Roman mythology, related in the conversations of that day, are strikingly correct. Along with this material you will find refutation to the foolish charges by enemies of this work that apples were not grown in Palestine and that Maria Valtorta could not have seen screw drivers on Joseph’s bench! [And also the charge that there are a lot of useless conversations in the Work.]


While literarily gifted, Maria Valtorta had only an average education, had never been to Palestine, was sick, suffering and bed-ridden for most of her life, and in this condition had access to only her Bible and small catechism during the years of her writing. Verification of so many of these locations and descriptions known only by experts in their fields and that these details were included at Jesus’ own request for “the difficult doctor’s of the Church,” is not only proof this is an eye-witness account but that these revelations were intended by Heaven to be accepted by the Church as authoritative for providing definitive clarification on so much of the Church’s teachings that had become clouded and confused by too many human elements.


Source: https://www.academia.edu/49143359/IN_VIAGGIO_CON_MARIA_VALTORTA?email_work_card=abstract-read-more


View my Catholic books Here

 

 

 

Tuesday, October 15, 2024

St. Gregory of Nyssa’s meditation on the words “Our Father Who Art in Heaven.”

When therefore the Lord teaches us in this prayer to call God “Father,” I believe He is doing nothing less than ordaining an exalted and sublime way of life. 

 

Christ leads us to heaven itself, having made it accessible to all. He does so through the practice of goodness and virtue. In this manner He brings us close to God through prayer. For this is the power of His words in the Lord's Prayer, a prayer by which we learn not merely sounds uttered through syllables of speech, but the knowledge of the ascent to God achieved through a spiritual way of life. We can comprehend the divine mystery through the words of the Lord's Prayer.

 

Christ begins with the words, "When you pray" (Mt 6:7). The Lord said to the disciples: "When you pray, say,‘Our Father who art in heaven’" (Mt 6:9). Somewhere in the Psalms the great David says, "Who will give me wings like a dove?" (Ps 55:6). I, too, would dare speak with the same voice. Who will give me such wings as to fly with my mind to the height of the noble meaning of these words? I need to leave the whole earth behind. I would have to remove my mind far from all things that change and are in flux. By attaining to an unchanging and unwavering disposition of the soul, I would first earnestly make Him my friend who is eternal and unchangeable. Only then would I invoke that most intimate Name and say, "Father!"

 

What quality of soul must the speaker possess to speak of God as "Our Father!" What confidence of spirit! What purity of conscience! To perceive God's ineffable glory, he must comprehend the mystery of God as far as it is possible from the names that have been conceived of and attributed to God in the Scriptures. He must learn that the divine nature of God is goodness, holiness, joy, power, glory, purity and eternity. Whatever God may be in His deep mystery, He possesses all these eternal and many other conceivable attributes that properly belong to the Divine Nature. Let us say that a person could understand all these endowments of God through the study of Holy Scriptures as well as one's own creative reflection. Could such a person even then dare to utter the sacred Name and call such a God his own Father?

 

One thing is very clear. If he had any sense, he would not dare address God with such a Name and say "Father," unless he perceived a reflection of the same attributes in himself. For it is impossible that God who is good in His very essence should be the Father of anyone engaged in evil activities. God who is holy could not be the Father of one defiled in life, nor He who is Eternal be the Father of one prone to every change, nor He who is the Father of life be the Father of one dead in sin. Similarly, God who is pure and spotless cannot be the Father of those who behave unseemly, neither can God who is generous be the Father of those who are greedy, nor the All Good One be the Father of those who in any way participate in evil things.

 

Someone may indeed dare seek intimacy with God while yet knowing himself to be in need of purification, discerning that his wicked conscience is filled with stains and evil wounds. If such a person, prior to being cleansed from these many evils, approaches God to call Him "Father," it would be like a person who is unjust and impure, and yet dares to address the One who is Most just and pure. It would be, at it were, to name God as the Father of one's own wickedness, a flagrant insolence. Such a person's words would amount to no less than mockery. Why? Because the word "Father" signifies fatherhood–the source and cause of a person who is made to exist by God. Therefore, whoever invokes God as Father and still possesses a wicked conscience, he in fact accuses God of nothing less than being the source and cause of his own evils.

 

According to the apostle Paul, however, "there is no communion between light and darkness" (2 Cor 6:14). Rather, the contrary is true. The light seeks intimacy, with what is just, the good with what is good, the incorruptible with what is incorruptible. The opposite things seek intimacy with their own kind. The Lord said: "A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit" (Mt 7:18). 

 

If someone is possessed, as Scripture puts it, by hardness of heart and dares to utter the words of the Lord's Prayer, he pursues falsehood. Let him know that such a person calls Father not the Heavenly One, but the Infernal One. The latter is himself a liar and the father of lies (Jn 8:44) that may arise in any given person. He is sin and the father of sin. For this reason, those whose soul is given to evil passions are called “children of wrath" (Eph 2:3) by the Apostle Paul. He who separates himself from true life is named "son of perdition” (Jn 17:12). And someone who is loose and immoral is called "the son of traitorous maidens” (1 Sam 20:30). on the contrary, those who have a conscience full of light are called "sons of light and of the day" (1 Thess 5:5). And those who have sought to fortify themselves with divine power are called “sons of power” (1 Sam 10:26).

 

When therefore the Lord teaches us in this prayer to call God “Father,” I believe He is doing nothing less than ordaining an exalted and sublime way of life. For He who is the Truth does not of course teach us to lie, that is, to state that which we are not. He does not want us to name God as Father when it is not our right. But when we dare call the Incorruptible God, the One perfectly just and good, "our Father," we must attest to our kinship with Him by our way of life. Do you see how much preparation we need? What quality of life? How much and what kind of diligence in order that our conscience rise to that level of confidence to dare address God as "Father?

 

When we approach God, let us first examine our way of life. Let us see if we inwardly possess some quality worthy of divine kinship. And then we can take courage to speak those words. For the Lord who has directed us to say "Father" did not thereby permit us to speak a lie. Therefore, whoever conducts himself worthily of God, it is he who rightly gazes toward the heavenly city. It is he who rightly names the King of heaven "Father" and calls the heavenly blessedness his own homeland. Where does the aim of our advice lead? To think of the things above, where God is. It is there that each should lay the foundation stones of his home. It is there that each should lay up treasures and each lift up his heart. "For where the treasure is, there is also the heart" (Mt 6:21). Then one can continuously behold the beauty of the Father and adorn his own soul with that same beauty.

 

Extracted from: 

https://www.orthodoxprayer.org/Lords_Prayer.html

 

St. Gregory of Nyssa, (c. 335 – c. 394), was an early Roman Christian prelate who served as Bishop of Nyssa (in Turkey) from 372 to 376 and from 378 until his death in 394. He is venerated as a saint in Eastern Orthodoxy, Catholicism, Oriental Orthodoxy, Anglicanism, and Lutheranism. Gregory, his elder brother St. Basil of Caesarea, and their friend St. Gregory of Nazianzus are collectively known as the Cappadocian Fathers. He was an erudite Christian theologian who made significant contributions to the doctrine of the Trinity and the Nicene Creed.

 

See my Catholic books at this Link.

 

 

 

 

 



Thursday, October 3, 2024

The Our Father as explained by Our Lord – Part Two.

[In Maria Valtorta’s writings there are a number of separate teachings on the Lord’s Prayer given by Jesus Himself.]

 

If the world were able to live out the “Our Father,” the Kingdom of God would be in the world.

 

In the “Our Father” the perfection of prayer is found. Observe: no act is absent in the brevity of the formula. Faith, hope, charity, obedience, resignation, abandonment, entreaty, contrition, and mercy are present. In saying it, you pray with all Paradise, during the first four petitions; then, leaving Heaven, which is the dwelling that awaits you, you return to the earth, remaining with your arms upraised towards Heaven to make entreaties for your earthly needs and to ask for aid in the battle to be won in order to go back up above.

 

Our Father, who art in heaven.”

 

[…] Only my love could tell you, “Say 'Our Father'.” By this expression I publicly invested you with the sublime title of sons and daughters of the Most High and brothers and sisters of mine. If someone, burdened by the consideration of his human nothingness, may doubt that he is a child of God, created in his image and likeness, on considering these words of mine, he can no longer doubt. The Word of God does not err and does not lie. And the Word tells you, “Say 'Our Father'.”

 

To have a father is something sweet and a powerful aid. In the material order, I wanted to have a father on earth to protect my existence as a baby, as a boy, and as a young man. By this I wanted to teach you − both children and fathers − how great the moral figure of the father is. But to have a Father of absolute perfection, as the Father in Heaven is, is the sweetness of sweetnesses, the aid of aids. Look at this Father-God with holy fear, but let grateful love for the Giver of life in heaven and on earth always be stronger than fear.

 

Hallowed be thy Name.”

 

With the same movement as the seraphim and all the angelic choirs, to whom and with whom you join in glorifying the name of God, repeat this exalting, grateful, just praise to the Holy of Holies. Repeat it while thinking of Me − I, God, the Son of God, who, before you, pronounced it with supreme veneration and supreme love. Repeat it in joy and in sorrow, in light and in darkness, in peace and in war. Blessed are those children who have never doubted the Father and at every hour and in every event have been able to say to Him, “Blessed be thy Name!”

 

Thy kingdom come.”

 

This invocation ought to be the pulsation of the pendulum of your entire life, and everything should gravitate around this invocation of Goodness. For the Kingdom of God in hearts, and passing from hearts into the world, would like to say, “Goodness, Peace, and every other virtue”. Accentuate your lives, then, with numberless appeals for the advent of this Kingdom. But let them be living appeals − that is, to act in life by applying your sacrifice of every hour, for to act well means to sacrifice nature to this end.

 

Thy Will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.”

 

The Kingdom of Heaven will belong to whoever has done the Will of the Father, not to those who have heaped words upon words and then rebelled against the Father's will […]. Here, too, you unite to all of Paradise, which does the Will of the Father. And if the inhabitants of the Kingdom do it, won't you do so to become, in turn, the inhabitants of Heaven? Oh, the joy that has been prepared for you by the Triune Love of God! How can you fail to work with a persevering will so as to conquer it?

 

Those doing the Will of the Father live in God. In living in God, they cannot err, cannot sin, and cannot lose their dwelling in Heaven, for the Father has you do nothing except what is Good and what, in being Good, saves from sinning and leads to Heaven. Those making the Father's Will their own, while annulling their will, know and savor − while on earth − the Peace which is the endowment of the blessed. Those doing the Will of the Father, while killing their perverse and perverted will, are no longer men: they are already spirits moved by love and living in love. You must, with good will, tear your will out of your heart and replace it with the Will of the Father.

 

After having provided for the petitions regarding the spirit, since you are poor, living amidst the needs of the flesh, ask Him who supplies food to the birds of the air and clothing for the lilies of the field for bread.

 

Give us this day our daily bread.” 

 

I said this day and I said bread. I never say anything useless. “This day. Ask the Father for help day by day. It is a measure of prudence, justice, and humility.

 

Prudence: if you had everything at once, you would waste a great deal. You are eternal children and capricious, in addition. The gifts of God should not be wasted. Furthermore, if you had everything, you would forget God.

 

Justice: Why should you have everything at once when I received help from the Father day by day? And would it not be unjust to think that it is well for God to give you everything together, […] in the fear that God will not provide tomorrow? Distrust − you do not reflect on this − is a sin. God must not be distrusted. He loves you perfectly. He is the most perfect Father. To ask for everything at once affronts trust and offends the Father.

 

Humility: having to ask day by day refreshes in your mind the concept of your nothingness, of your condition as poor ones, and of the All and Wealth of God. Bread. I said “bread” because bread is the king of foods, the one indispensable for life. With one word and in the word I have enclosed − so that all of you would request them − all the needs of your stay on earth. But as the temperature of your spirituality varies, so does the extent of the word. 

 

Bread as food for those who have an embryonic spirituality, to such a degree that it is already a great deal if they are able to ask God for the food to fill their stomachs. There are some who do not ask for it and take it with violence, cursing God and their brothers and sisters. These are looked upon with wrath by the Father because they trample upon the precept from which the others come: “Love your God with all your heart; love your neighbor as yourself.'

 

Bread as help in moral and material needs for those living not only for their stomachs, but who are able to live for thought as well, possessing a more highly-formed spirituality. 

 

Bread as religion for those who, even more highly formed, place God before the satisfactions of sense and of human sentiment and are already capable of spreading their wings in the supernatural.

 

Bread as spirit, bread as sacrifice for those who, once the full age of the spirit is reached, are able to live in spirit and in truth, concerning themselves with the flesh only to the extent that is strictly necessary to continue to exist in mortal life, until it is time to go to God. They have now chiseled themselves according to my model and are living copies of Me over whom the Father bends in a loving embrace.

 

Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

 

There is no one, among the number of those created, except for my Mother, who has not had to seek the Father's forgiveness for more or less serious sins, according to each one's capacity to be a child of God. Ask the Father to erase you from the list of his debtors. If you do so in a humble, sincere, and contrite spirit, you will incline the Eternal in your favor.

 

But an essential condition to receive, to be forgiven, is to forgive. If you only seek mercy and do not grant it to your neighbor, you will not experience God's forgiveness. God does not like the hypocritical and the cruel, and whoever refuses to forgive his brother refuses the Father's forgiveness for himself. Consider, moreover, that no matter how much you may have been wounded by your neighbor, the wounds you have inflicted upon God are infinitely more serious. Let this thought spur you to forgive everything, as I forgave through my Perfection and to teach you forgiveness.

 

Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”

 

God does not lead you into temptation. God tempts you with gifts of Goodness alone, and to attract you to Himself. You, interpreting my words incorrectly, think they mean that God leads you into temptation to test you. No. The good Father who is in Heaven permits evil, but does not create it. He is the Good from which every good flows. But Evil exists. It existed from the moment Lucifer set himself up against God. It is up to you to make Evil a Good by overcoming it and by beseeching the Father for the strength to overcome it. 

 

This is what you request in the last petition. That God may grant you enough strength to be able to withstand temptation. Without his aid temptation would bend you, for it is cunning and strong, and you are dull and weak. But the Father's Light illuminates you, and the Father's Power strengthens you, and the Father's Love protects you, so that Evil dies and you are left freed from it.

 

This is what you ask for in the “Our Father” which I have taught to you. Therein everything is comprehended; everything understood; everything which it is just to request and grant, requested. If the world were able to live out the “Our Father,” the Kingdom of God would be in the world. But the world is unable to pray. It is unable to love. It is unable to save itself. It is capable only of hating, sinning, and condemning itself.

 

But I did not give and make this prayer for the world, which has preferred to be the kingdom of Satan. I have given and made this prayer for those whom the Father has given to Me because they are his, and I have made it so that they may be one with the Father and with Me, beginning in this life, so as to reach the fullness of union in the other. 

 

Based on Jesus’ Commentary from The Notebooks, July 7, 1943.

 

View my web page and Catholic books Here. 

 

Monday, September 23, 2024

Teachings of St. Padre Pio.

From his Letters:  


1. Do not turn in on yourself as so often happens, unfortunately. In the midst of trials which may afflict you, just place your confidence in our Supreme Good in the knowledge that He takes more care of us than a mother takes of her child. (Pg. 260, Letter 36, Pietrelcina, 26-11-14)

 

2. Don’t allow any sadness to dwell in your soul, for sadness prevents the Holy Spirit from acting freely. If ever you insist on being sad, then let it be a holy sadness at the sight of the evil that is spreading more and more in society nowadays. How many poor are every day deserting God, our Supreme Good! (Pg. 260, Letter 36, Pietrelcina, 26-11-14)


3. To refuse to submit one’s own judgement to that of others, especially to those who are quite expert in the field in question, is a sign that we possess very little docility and an all too obvious sign of secret pride. (Pg. 260, Letter 36, Pietrelcina, 26-11-14)


4. The soul that is destined to reign with Jesus Christ in eternal glory, then, must be remodeled by the blows of hammer and chisel. But what are these blows of the hammer and chisel by which the divine Artist prepares the stone, the chosen soul? These strokes of the chisel are the shadows, fears, temptations, spiritual torments and agitation, with a dash of desolation and even physical pain. (Pg. 97, Letter 8, Pietrelcina, 19-5-14)


5. Never lie down to sleep without having first examined your conscience on the way you have spent the day and without first turning your thoughts to God. Then offer and consecrate your whole person and that of every Christian.

Offer, moreover, to the glory of His divine Majesty, the rest you are about to take and never forget your Guardian Angel who is always close to you, who never leaves you no matter how badly you treat him. O unspeakable excellence of this good angel of ours! How many times, alas, have I made him weep when I refused to comply with his wishes which were also God’s wishes! May this most faithful friend of our save from further unfaithfulness. (Pg. 292, Letter 41, Pietrelcina, 17-12-14)


6. Drive away what the enemy is whispering loudly in your when he wants you to believe you are almost on the point of being lost. Despite these evil insinuations, the Lord is with you as never before in your tribulations. God tells us. Take heart, then, and don’t be afraid, for it is quite certain that the one who fears to be lost will not be lost and the one who fights with his eyes fixed on God will cry victory and the triumphal hymn. There is nothing to be afraid, for the heavenly Father has promised us the necessary help to prevent us from being overcome by temptations. (Pg. 411, Letter 62, Piertelcina, 10-4-15)


7. May Mary, the Mother of Jesus and our Mother, enable you to understand all that is contained in the great secret of suffering borne with a Christian spirit. May she obtain for you all the strength you require to climb to the summit of Calvary loaded with your own cross. Great strength is needed, unfortunately, to follow this path, but take heart, for the Savior will never leave you alone or without his help. (Pg. 487, Letter 79, Pietrelcina, 4-8-1915)


8. No matter how great the trial to which the Lord is to subject you, no matter how unbearable your spiritual desolation at certain moments of your life, never lose heart. Have recourse with more childlike trust to Jesus who will never be able to resist bestowing on you some little solace and comfort. Turn to Him at all times even when the devil tries to cast a pall over your life by showing you your sins lift up your voice loudly to Him and let it express your spiritual humility, your heartfelt contrition and your vocal prayer. It is true that God’s power triumphs over everything, but humble and suffering prayer prevails over God Himself. (Pg. 504, Letter 82, Pietrelcina, 7-9-1915.)

 

His Famous Quotes:

  • Prayer is the best weapon we have; it is the key to God’s heart. You must speak to Jesus not only with your lips, but with your heart. In fact on certain occasions you should only speak to Him with your heart.

  • Some people are so foolish that they think they can go through life without the help of the Blessed Mother. Love the Madonna and pray the rosary, for her Rosary is the weapon against the evils of the world today. All graces given by God pass through the Blessed Mother.

  • Every Holy Mass, heard with devotion, produces in our souls marvelous effects, abundant spiritual and material graces which we, ourselves, do not know…It is easier for the earth to exist without the sun than without the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass!

  • Pray, Hope, and Don’t Worry.

  • Our Lord loves you and loves you tenderly; and if He does not let you feel the sweetness of His love, it is to make you more humble and abject in your own eyes.

  • Go to the Madonna. Love her! Always say the Rosary. Say it well. Say it as often as you can! Be souls of prayer. Never tire of praying, it is what is essential. Prayer shakes the Heart of God, it obtains necessary graces!

  • On this earth everyone has his cross. But we must act in such a way that we be not the bad, but good thief.

  • God commands us to love Him, not as much as He deserves, because He knows our capabilities and therefore He does not ask us to do what we cannot do. But He asks us to love Him according to our strength, with all our soul, all our mind, and all our heart.

  • You must concentrate on pleasing God alone, and if He is pleased, you must be pleased.

  • May the Child Jesus be the star that guides you through the desert of your present life.

  • Prayer is the oxygen of the soul. Padre Pio

  • The Lord is a Father, the most tender and best of fathers. He cannot fail to be moved when His children appeal to Him.

  • Only in Heaven will everything be as beautiful as spring, as pleasant as autumn, and as full of love as summer.

  • Who can assure us that we will be alive tomorrow? Let us listen to the voice of our conscience, to the voice of the royal prophet: “Today, if you hear God’s voice, harden not your heart.” Let us not put off from one moment to another (what we should do) because the (next moment) is not yet ours.

  • Through the study of books one seeks God; by meditation one finds him. 

     

    See my books on Saint Padre Pio and others Here.   




Friday, September 20, 2024

St. Cassian on the Lord’s Prayer.

Our daily bread: “Our daily need for it warns us that we should pour out this prayer constantly, because there is no day on which it is not necessary.” 

 

The mind, having been dissolved and flung into love of Him, speaks most familiarly and with particular devotion to God as to its own father. […] We must tirelessly seek this condition when it says: 'Our Father." When, therefore, we confess with our own voice that the God and Lord of the universe is our Father, we profess that we have in fact been admitted from our servile condition into an adopted sonship. 

 

Then we add: 'Who art in heaven,' so that, avoiding with utter horror the dwelling place of the present life, wherein we sojourn on this earth as on a journey and are kept at a far distance from our Father, we may instead hasten with great desire to that region in which we say that our Father dwells and do nothing that would make us unworthy of this profession of ours and of the nobility of so great an adoption, or that would deprive us as degenerate of our paternal inheritance and cause us to incur the wrath of his justice and severity. 

 

Having advanced to the rank and status of sons, we shall from then on burn constantly with that devotion which is found in good sons, so that we may no longer expend all our energies for our own benefit but for the sake of our Father's glory, saying to him: 'Hallowed be thy name.' Thus we testify that our desire and our joy is the glory of our Father, since we have become imitators of him who said: 'The one who speaks of himself seeks his own glory. But the one who seeks the glory of Him who sent him is true, and there is no unrighteousness in him. 

 

The words, 'Hallowed be thy name' can also be quite satisfactorily understood in this way – namely, that the hallowing of God is our perfection. And so when we say to him: 'Hallowed be thy name,' we are saying in other words: Make us such, Father, that we may deserve to understand and grasp how great your hallowing is and, of course, that you may appear as hallowed in our spiritual way of life. This is effectively fulfilled in us when 'people see our good works and glorify our Father who is in heaven.' 

 

The second petition of a most pure mind eagerly desires the kingdom of its Father to come immediately. This means that in which Christ reigns daily in holy persons, which happens when the rule of the devil has been cast out of our hearts by the annihilation of the foul vices and God has begun to hold sway in us through the good fragrance of the virtues; when chastity, peace, and humility reign in our minds, and fornication has been conquered, rage overcome, and pride trampled upon. And of course it means that which was promised universally to all the perfect and to all the sons of God at the appointed time, when it will be said to them by Christ: 'Come, blessed of my Father, take possession of the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.'

 

Desiring and hoping for this with intent and unwavering gaze, we tell him: 'Thy kingdom come.' For we know by the witness of our own conscience that when he appears we shall soon be his companions. No sinner dares to say this or to wish for it, since a person who knows that at his coming he will at once be paid back for his deserts not with a palm or rewards but with punishment has no desire to see the Judge's tribunal. 

 

The third petition is of sons: 'Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.' There cannot be a greater prayer than to desire that earthly things should deserve to equal heavenly ones. For what does it mean to say: 'Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,' if not that human beings should be like angels and that, just as God's will is fulfilled by them in heaven, so also all those who are on earth should do not their own but his will? No one will really be able to say this but him who believes that God regulates all things that are seen, whether fortunate or unfortunate, for the sake of our well-being, and that he is more provident and careful with regard to the salvation and interests of those who are his own than we are for ourselves. 

 

And of course it is to be understood in this way – namely, that the will of God is the salvation of all, according to the text of blessed Paul: 'Who desires all to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.' Of this will the prophet Isaiah, speaking in the person of God the Fathers, also says: 'All my will shall be done.' When we tell him, then: 'Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,' we are praying in other words: Father, just as those who are in heaven are saved by the knowledge of you, so also are those who are on earth." 

 

Then: 'Give us this day our "supersubstantial bread,"which another evangelist has referred to as 'daily.' The former indicates the noble quality of this substance, which places it above all other substances and which, in the sublimity of its magnificence and power to sanctify, surpasses every creature, whereas the latter expresses the nature of its use and its goodness. For when it says 'daily' it shows that we are unable to attain the spiritual life on a day without it. 

 

When it says 'this day' it shows that it must be taken daily and that yesterday's supply of it is not enough if we have not been given of it today as well. Our daily need for it warns us that we should pour out this prayer constantly, because there is no day on which it is not necessary for us to strengthen the heart of our inner man by eating and receiving this. But the expression 'this day' can also be understood with reference to the present life – namely: Give us this bread as long as we dwell in this world. For we know that it will also be given in the world to come to those who have deserved it from you, but we beg you to give it to us this day, because unless a person deserves to receive it in this life he will be unable to partake of it in that life. 

 

And ‘forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.' Oh, the unspeakable mercy of God! It has not merely given us a form of prayer and taught us how to act in a manner acceptable to him, uprooting both anger and sadness through the requirements of the formula that he gave, by which he ordered that we should always pray it. It has also conferred on those who pray an opportunity by disclosing to them the way that they may bring upon themselves the merciful and kind judgment of God, and it has conferred a certain power by which we can moderate the sentence of our Judge, persuading him to pardon our sins by the example of our own forgiveness, when we tell him: 'Forgive us as we forgive.' 

 

[…] some of us – which is bad – are accustomed to show ourselves mild and very merciful with respect to things that are committed to God's disadvantage, although they may be great crimes, but to be very harsh and inexorable exactors with respect to the debts of even the slightest offenses committed against ourselves. 

 

Whoever, then, does not from his heart forgive the brother who has offended him will, by this entreaty, be asking not for pardon but for condemnation for himself, and by his own say-so he will be requesting a harsher judgment for himself when he says: Forgive me as I also have forgiven. And when he has been dealt with according to his own petition, what else will the consequence be that that, following his own example, he will be punished with an implacable anger and an irremissible condemnation? Therefore, if we wish to be judged mercifully, we must ourselves be merciful toward those who have offended us. For we shall be forgiven to the degree that we have forgiven those who have injured us by any wrongdoing whatsoever. 

 

Some people fear this, and when this prayer is recited together in church by the whole congregation they pass over this line in silence, lest by their own words they obligate rather than excuse themselves. They do not understand that it is in vain that they contrive to quibble in this way with the Judge of all, who wished to show beforehand how he would judge his suppliants. For since he does not wish to be harsh and inexorable toward them, he indicated the form that his judgment would take. Thus, just as we want to be judged by him, so also we should judge our brothers if they have offended us in anything, 'because there is judgment without mercy for the one who has not acted mercifully.' 

 

Next there follows: 'And subject us not to the trial. In this regard there arises a question of no small importance. For if we pray not to be allowed to be tried, how will the strength of our steadfastness be tested, according to the words: 'Whoever has not been tried has not been proven?' And again: 'Blessed is the man who undergoes trial?' Therefore, the words 'Subject us not to the trial' do not mean: Do not allow us ever to be tried, but rather: Do not allow us to be overcome when we are tried. 

 

For Job was tried, but he was not subjected to the trial. For he did not ascribe folly to God, nor did he as a blasphemer, with wicked tongue, accede to the will of the one trying him, to which he was being drawn. Abraham was tried and Joseph was tried, but neither of them was subjected to the trial, for neither of them consented to the one trying them. 

 

Then there follows: 'But deliver us from evil.' This means: Do not allow us to be tried by the devil 'beyond our capacity, but with the trial also provide a way out, so that we may be able to endure.' 

 

You see, then, what sort of measure and form for prayer have been proposed to us by the Judge who is to be prayed to by it. In it there is contained no request for riches, no allusion to honors, no demand for power and strength, no mention of bodily health or of temporal existence. For the Creator of eternal things wishes nothing transitory, nothing base, nothing temporal to be asked for from himself. And so, whoever neglects these sempiternal petitions and chooses to ask for something transitory and passing from him does very great injury to his grandeur and largesse, and he offends rather than propitiates his Judge with the paltriness of his prayer. 

 

Extracted from this site: https://www.orthodoxprayer.org/Articles_files/Cassian-Lords%20Prayer.html



A brief bio of the saint courtesy of https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=3955


St. John Cassian was an Eastern monk and theological writer. He went to Palestine in 380 with a companion, Germanus, and became a monk in Egypt. In 400 he entered into the discipleship of St. John Chrysostom, going to Rome to defend the much-oppressed saint before Pope Innocent I. Ordained in Rome, John started monasteries in southern France, near Marseilles, thus helping to pioneer monasticism in Europe. His two main writings, Institutes of the Monastic Life and Conferences on the Egyptian Monks, were much praised by St. Benedict and were long influential; the former had a direct impact upon Benedict during the time that he was composing his famed Rule. John also authored the work De Incarnatione Domini, in seven books, at the behest of Pope Leo I the Great so as to inform the Western Church of the details of the teachings of the heresiarch Nestorius. While never canonized officially in the West, John has long been considered a saint among the Eastern Churches. 

 

View my Catholic books HERE.