"Take Courage"

Yesterday was the feast of St. Christopher (or in Spanish Cristobal) Magallanes and Companions, martyrs during the terrible persecution of the Church in Mexico during the 1920's.  The Mass readings of the day fit perfectly into their feast because in the last verse of the Gospel (John 16: 29-33) Jesus proclaimed:  "In the world you will have trouble, but take courage, I have conquered the world." 

Why will we have trouble in the world?  Because the upstart prince of this world is Satan who is engaged in a war against Christ and his followers, indeed against the human race whom he hates.  St. Ignatius called Satan "the enemy of our human nature."  He has sought to destroy individuals and our race from the beginning.  Thus it is to be expected that in the world we "will have trouble."

But Jesus tells us to "take courage."  I always like to point out that the root of that word "courage" is "cor" or "heart."  Jesus tells us to take heart, to take his Sacred Heart.  We take and receive his Heart in the Eucharist where he comes to us Body and Blood, soul and divinity, including his Heart.  His Heart transforms our hearts so that no matter what happens to us we can be strong in the knowledge of God's love. 

The 22 priests and 3 laymen were a few of the many who were killed during what is known as the Cristero War of 1926-29.  As the Mexican government forbade priests and religious to wear distinctive garb, limited their numbers, and closed down schools and seminaries, Catholics joined in peaceful protest.  Some rose up in open and violent rebellion.  It's estimated that at least 40 priests were killed.  There are also 13 other martyrs who have been beatified, including a 14 year old boy named Jose Sanchez del Rio. 

Soon the movie "For Greater Glory" which tells the story of the Cristero War will be released in the U.S.  For a trailer of the movie, see here. 

During this time of persecution, the Mexican government blew up a shrine to Christ the King which was located on Cubilete Hill, the geographical center of Mexico.  It was rebuilt in 1944 and Pope Benedict visited it during his recent trip to Mexico.  The statue shows Christ the King with two crowns, one that is royal and the other of thorns.  In his talk there Pope Benedict said the following:

"Dear brothers and sisters, this monument represents Christ the King. But his crowns, one of a sovereign, the other of thorns, indicate that his royal status does not correspond to how it has been or is understood by many. His kingdom does not stand on the power of his armies subduing others through force or violence. It rests on a higher power that wins over hearts: the love of God that he brought into the world with his sacrifice and the truth to which he bore witness. This is his sovereignty which no one can take from him and which no one should forget."

Some have said that what happened in Mexico in the first half of the 20th Century could happen here in the U.S.  In fact, our bishops have called for a "Fortnight for Freedom" to engage Catholics in praying and working to safeguard religious freedom.  The USCCB web site has information about this special time that will run from June 21, the eve of the feast of Sts. John Fisher and Thomas More, Martyrs of Conscience and Religious Liberty, until July 4. 

Christ the King has conquered the world as he said when he died and rose from the dead.  He is the victor over Satan and sin and death.  The Mexican Martyrs knew this and it gave them the courage to live and die for the faith.  Recognizing that Christ is the true ruler of this world, let us share in the cry that was on their lips when they died: Viva Cristo Rey!

Pope Benedict's First Communion

Yesterday was the anniversary of my First Communion and three years ago I wrote in this blog about how I remembered various things about the day but not much about the actual experience of receiving the Body and Blood of Christ for the first time.  You can read more about that and also something that Pope Benedict said in 2005 about his First Communion here. 

Recently, on April 22, as he prayed the Regnia Coeli  in St. Peter's Square, Pope Benedict talked about the need for good preparation before children receive our Lord for the first time.  He said:  "Dear friends, it is usual in the Easter season for the Church to administer First Communion to children. I therefore urge parish priests, parents and catechists to prepare well for this feast of faith with great fervor, but also with moderation." 

What did he mean by "with great fervor, but also with moderation."  The answer can be found, I think, in something he said last year to a group of children with whom he met when he visited Benin, Africa.  He contrasted his own interior experience of his First Holy Communion with the exterior celebrations that often accompany the event and which need moderation lest they overshadow the actual experience of receiving our Lord for the first time.  Here's what he said:

The day of my First Holy Communion was one of the most beautiful days of my life. It is the same for you, isn’t it? And why is that? It’s not only because of our nice clothes or the gifts we receive, nor even because of the parties! It is above all because, that day, we receive Jesus Christ for the first time! When I receive Communion, Jesus comes to live in me. I should welcome him with love and listen closely to him. In the depths of my heart, I can tell him, for example: “Jesus, I know that you love me. Give me your love so that I can love you in return and love others with your love. I give you all my joys, my troubles and my future.”

His words challenge me to strive to make sure that I do not receive Holy Communion casually.  They challenge me to make an offering of myself to the One who has offered himself for me and to me. 

"I Have Called You Friends"

Last Friday and again today, the feast of the Apostle St. Matthias, our Gospel was from John Chapter 15 where Jesus tells his apostles (and us): "I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing.  I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father." 

For the Son of God, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, to call us his "friends" is a very great thing.  It is not simply a matter of calling us friends.  Through Baptism he actually changes us and raises us to his level, for true friendship demands a certain equality.  Grace makes this possible.  Sanctifying Grace makes us holy as God is holy.  It is, in the words of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, "deifying grace" (#1999).  As much as dogs have been called "man's best friend," a dog can never really be a friend because it is incapable of entering into a relationship that requires a certain equality.  We too were incapable of friendship until Jesus came, united himself to our human nature, and transformed us so that we could enter into a true relationship with him. 

One of my favorite books for daily meditation is the revised four volume version of Discalced Carmelite Father Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen's Divine Intimacy.  It first appeared (and is still available) in the 1950's as a one volume work but has been revised to fit the changes in the liturgical calendar after the Second Vatican Council.  Here is a quote about God's friendship with humanity that appears in the reflection for Thursday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time:

Friendship presupposes a certain equality and community of life, whereas between God and men there is a supreme and limitless distance.  But for the very purpose of making friendship possible between himself and men, God became man and shared his divinity with man.  "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us" (Jn 1:14), so that we might become "partakers of the divine nature" (2 Pet 1:4).  The foundation of friendship, of communion was established.  Friendship demands reciprocal love.  God has loved us first; our love can be only a response: "We love, because he first loved us" (1 Jn 4:19).  We return God's love, first of all my accepting it, by opening our heart to him, and letting ourselves be loved.  The very love which God has infused into us becomes the beginning of our response, of our love.  "Love is from God" (ib. 7), it can come only from him, and moreover we cannot love God supernaturally except with God's very love.  If we correspond, there will be perfect friendship, because it will be based on equality of love.  The mystery of the friendship between God and mankind is based entirely upon the nature of charity, which is not human love, but divine love, by which we become capable of loving divinely.

Jesus calls us friends and then transforms us to make us capable to being real friends, not just in name, the way a dog is "man's best friend." 

Friends spend time together.  They enjoy one another's company and miss each other when they are separated.  So it is with the friendship between Jesus and us.  Prayer is the way in which we spend time with him and prayer can fill our entire day when we offer that day to the Lord and try to remember to renew our offering frequently during the day.  Only sin separates us from him and when we find ourselves away and wandering, the memory of his love draws us back to re-establish our friendship in the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

Friends also share common interests and concerns.  Or, as Father Gabriel puts it:

The fellowship required by friendship calls for a communion of affections, of desires, and of the will.  A friend desires that which his friend desires.  We are God's friends if we will and do what God wills: if we keep his commandments, if in every thing we seek not our own will, but God's will.

This is what Jesus said right before calling his apostles "friends."  He said: "You are my friends if you do what I command you."  As the friends of Jesus, we share his desire for the salvation of every person.  This is God's will, as St. Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 2: 3-4: "God our savior, who wills everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth."  Jesus acted on his desire to save everyone by suffering, dying, and rising.  We share his desire and act upon it by offering ourselves one day at a time for the salvation of souls.  Jesus saved every soul ever created. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church (#605), quoting the 9th Century Council of Quiercy, states: "There is not, never has been, and never will be a single human being for whom Christ did not suffer." Not everyone has accepted Christ's act of love and the salvation he won for humanity.  Our daily offering now plays a very important part in the ongoing work of salvation by allowing God's will to be done in our lives, thus claiming more and more parts of his creation for him.  As friends of Jesus who do what he commands--"love one another as I love you"--we desire and offer ourselves with him now for the salvation of all.

The Peace of Christ

In yesterday's Gospel (John 14: 27-31a), Jesus, in the context of his farewell address during the Last Supper, says: "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.  Not as the world gives do I give it to you.  Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid."  With this Gospel in mind, the focus for Relevant Radio's "Inner Life" show, for which I was the guest spiritual director, was on "Attaining Peace in our Lives." 

We often think of peace as a feeling or as the absence of conflict and stress.  This isn't the kind of peace Jesus promised.  Recall the other words of Jesus: "Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth?  No, I tell you, but rather division" (Luke 12: 51). 

The Hebrew word for peace--"Shalom"--can help us understand what appear to be two contradictory statements.  According to scholars, "Shalom" is a term that is difficult to translate with just one English word.  It is much richer than simply "peace."  It has to do with the harmony that comes from right relationships.  It has to do with order. 

When our relationship with God is rightly ordered and in harmony, then, no matter what else is going on, we can find peace.  Peace is not so much "out there" but "in here," "within."  Being in harmony with God will lead to rejection and conflict in the world which, according to Jesus, has Satan as its ruler (see John 12: 31; 14: 30; 16: 11).  Jesus promised at the Last Supper that here in the world there will always be trouble, but peace can be found in him: "I have told you this so that you might have peace in me.  In the world you will have trouble, but take courage, I have conquered the world" (John 16: 33). 

No matter what is going on around us, we need to strive for inner peace.  Satan hates this peace and will do everything to take it away, for when we are not at peace within ourselves, we are more vulnerable to his other temptations.  The following quotes from Fr. Jacques Philippe's little book "Searching for and Maintaining Peace" make this clear.

"The devil does his utmost to banish peace from one's heart, because he knows that God abides in peace and it is in peace that He accomplishes great things." [Dom Lorenzo Scupoli's "The Spiritual Combat"]

"None of the thoughts that render us anxious and agitated in spirit in any way come from God, Who is the Prince of Peace.  These are the temptations of the enemy and consequently one must reject them and not take them into account." [St. Francis de Sales' "Letter to the Abbess de Puy d'Orbe"]

"Peace is order, it is harmony in each one of us, it is a continual joy that is born in witnessing a clear conscience, it is the holy joy of a heart wherein God reigns.  Peace is the way to perfection, or, even better, in peace dwells perfection.  And the devil, who knows all this very well, does everything possible to cause us to lose our peace." [St. Padre Pio]

What's in a Name?

I'm in St. Charles, Missouri, right outside St. Louis these days for a parish mission at Saints Joachim and Ann parish.  As always, I preached at all the Masses this weekend and invited the parishioners to take advantage of this opportunity where you don't have to go away to make a retreat but where the retreat comes to the parish.  Here's a bit of my homily:

We've all heard the expression, "What's in a name?"  It's a dismissive expression meant to say that names are not important.  What's important is the person.  But in the first reading, part of St. Peter's speech in Acts Chapter 4, we hear about a name that is very important as well as powerful.  It's a name that can heal a crippled man.  It's the only name, according to St. Peter, "under heaven given to the human race by which we are to be saved."  It's the name "Jesus." 

Several years ago a fifth grader asked me, "What was Jesus' middle name?"  I asked him what was Jesus' last name and he answered, "Christ."  I told him that at the time of Jesus they didn't have last names or middle names the way we do and that "Christ" was actually a title and not a name.  It means "Anointed One." 

At each of our baptisms we were given this title--"Christian"--for at baptism we were anointed with the Sacred Chrism.  We were joined to the Body of Christ and became Christians, Anointed Ones.  In the second reading from the First Letter of John we hear that God has bestowed a great love "on us that we may be called children of God."  But we are God's children not just in name but in reality for St. John continues: "Yet so we are."  This is not only our name but our deepest identity.

Every Fourth Sunday of Easter is known as "Good Shepherd Sunday" because that is what our Gospel is about.  It is also World Day of Prayer of Prayer for Vocations.  The Holy Father writes a special message for this day every year and in his message this year Pope Benedict quoted St. Paul's Letter to the Ephesians 1: 5.  God "chose us, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before him in love."  Commenting on this, Pope Benedict wrote: "We are loved by God even 'before' we come into existence! ... every human person is the fruit of God's thought and an act of his love, a love that is boundless, faithful and everlasting."  Think of it: God had you in mind from all eternity.  The thoughts of God are eternal.  It wasn't as though 9 or 10 months before your birth God decided, "I think I'll make so-and-so."  From all eternity God planned to create you.  You give God a pleasure and glory that no other person can give him. 

Then Pope Benedict wrote: "The discovery of this reality is what truly and profoundly changes our lives. ... Dear brothers and sisters, we need to open our lives to this love.  It is to the perfection of the Father's love (cf. Mt 5: 48) that Jesus Christ calls us every day!  The high standard of the Christian life consists in loving 'as' God loves; with a love that is shown in the total, faithful and fruitful gift of self."

God loves totally.  This is the meaning of the story of the Good Shepherd.  Unlike the "hired man" who runs when the wolf comes, the Good Shepherd risks his life for the sheep.  I suspect this teaching would have been shocking to those listening to Jesus.  What human would risk his or her life to protect animals?  It is just as shocking that God would do such a thing for his human creatures.  God became human, suffered, and died.  God sacrificed all to save his human flock.  We must be worth very much for God to do this. 

But we are not just sheep.  Our baptism has raised us up and joined us to Christ, the Good Shepherd.  We are called and empowered now to love as God loves, to make a total gift of ourselves to God and to his human flock for whom he sacrificed all.  At baptism we were anointed to be Good Shepherds with Christ.  We received the Holy Spirit to empower us to love like the Good Shepherd.  The Sacred Chrism with which we were anointed is used on only a few special occasions.  When this church building was first consecrated its walls were anointed with the Sacred Chrism, setting this space aside for a sacred purpose, for worship.  At the same time the altar of this church was anointed with Chrism, setting it aside for a sacred purpose, for worship.When I was ordained my hands were anointed with Sacred Chrism, setting them aside for a sacred purpose, for worship.  And when each of us was baptised and confirmed, we were anointed with Sacred Chrism, setting each one of us aside for a sacred purpose, for worship.  We fulfill this task by gathering as we do today to worship God together.  But we also worship God when we leave Mass.  We are called to worship God with each moment of our day.  Our entire life is meant to be an act of worship, an act of love for God and his flock.  The Morning Offering helps us to begin each day mindful of our holy call to worship God in our daily lives. 

Holy Communion Prayers

In preparing for my recent Divine Mercy talk, I came upon two prayers of St. Faustina that capture what it means to live a Eucharistic life.  This is the spirituality that we propose in the Apostleship of Prayer--to live the Eucharist in daily life by making an offering of ourselves one day at a time.  What empowers us to do this is our union with Christ and the transformation that follows.  I think these two prayers from St. Faustina's Diary express that mission and desire of ours.

Most sweet Jesus, set on fire my love for You and transform me into Yourself.  Divinize me that my deeds may be pleasing to You.  May this be accomplished by the power of the Holy Communion which I receive daily.  Oh, how greatly I desire to be wholly transformed into You, O Lord! [#1289]

Jesus, make my heart like unto Yours, or rather transform it into Your own Heart that I may sense the needs of other hearts, especially those who are sad and suffering.  May the rays of mercy rest in my heart. [#514]

The Sacred Heart and Divine Mercy

Last Sunday I led Divine Mercy devotions at Marytown, the National Shrine of St. Maximillian Kolbe, who was a contemporary of St. Faustina. I talked about devotion to the Sacred and Merciful Heart of Jesus.

An optional closing prayer for the Divine Mercy chaplet goes like this: "Eternal God, in whom mercy is endless and the treasury of compassion inexhaustible, look kindly upon us and increase Your mercy in us, that in difficult moments we might not despair nor become despondent, but with great confidence submit ourselves to Your holy will, which is Love and Mercy itself." This comes from #950 of St. Faustina's Diary.

What is this "holy will" of God? Our salvation. St. Paul, in his First Letter to Timothy, declares: "God our savior, who wills everyone to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth" (2: 4). Our Lord's words to St. Faustina echo this: "Write that the greater the misery of a soul, the greater its right to My mercy; [urge] all souls to trust in the unfathomable abyss of My mercy, because I want to save them all. On the cross, the fountain of My mercy was opened wide by the lance for all souls--no one have I excluded!" (#1182).

God wills all to be saved but he cannot impose that will on anyone. God cannot force his love on anyone. Love must be freely given and received. So when humanity rejected God's will and love, God set out to prove his love by sending his Son to live and suffer and die for us. On the cross his Sacred Heart was pierced and blood and water flowed forth. The image of Divine Mercy with its red and white rays coming from the center of the risen Jesus depict this. Jesus told St. Faustina: "The two rays denote Blood and Water. The pale ray stands for the Water which makes souls righteous. The red ray stands for the Blood which is the life of souls.... These two rays issued forth from the very depths of My tender mercy when My agonized Heart was opened by a lance on the Cross" (#299).

The rays come straight from the Sacred Heart of Jesus. This Heart reveals God's greatest attribute--Mercy. The Sacred Heart of Jesus is the Merciful Heart. It is Divine Mercy.

Are devotion to the Sacred Heart and devotion to Divine Mercy in competition? Has Divine Mercy replaced the Sacred Heart? No. Dr. Robert Stackpole, director of the John Paul II Institute of Divine Mercy in Stockbridge, MA, in his book Jesus, Mercy Incarnate, states that the Divine Mercy and the Sacred Heart are "so closely bound up with each other as to be absolutely inseparable." The reason is simple: "Jesus has only one Heart! His Sacred Heart is His Merciful Heart--they are one and the same." These devotions are not in competition. Dr. Stackpole writes: "In short, the differences between these two devotions are best described as differences of emphasis, for both spring from a common source: devotion to the same Heart of Jesus, overflowing with merciful love for us."

Anyone who reads the Diary of St. Faustina will see that Divine Mercy was revealed to her in the context of her devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Devotion to Divine Mercy is a further development of devotion to the Sacred Heart and the Eucharist.

At the Last Supper Jesus told his disciples "I have much more to tell you, but you cannot bear it now" (John 16: 12). Jesus is the fullest revelation of God. There is no new revelation after Jesus. This is the Church's constant teaching. Yet, Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to continue to help the Church grow in its understanding of this revelation of God's love in the Person of Jesus. Moreover, after his ascension to the right hand of the Father, Jesus has also appeared from time to time to teach the Church.

He appeared to Saul and asked him: "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?" (Acts 9: 4). In this question Jesus made it clear to the future St. Paul that he and his Body, the Church, are one. Later, when he wrote his First Letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul would elaborate on this doctrine of the Body of Christ and the union of Christ with the members of the Church (see chapters 11-13).

In the 1200's Jesus appear to St. Juliana during a time when belief in the Blessed Sacrament was disappearing. He asked for a feast in honor of his Body and Blood, Corpus Christi. In the 1600's, at a time when devotion to God's love in the Eucharist had grown cold and many of the faithful were filled with fear rather than love, Jesus appeared to St. Margaret Mary and asked for a feast in honor of his Sacred Heart. He told her: "My divine Heart is so passionately fond of the human race, and of you in particular, that it cannot keep back the pent-up flames of its burning charity any longer. They must burst out through you and reveal my Heart to the world, so as to enrich mankind with my precious treasures. He complained to her: "There it is, that Heart so deeply in love with men, it spared no means of proof--wearing itself out until it was utterly spent! This meets with scant appreciation from most of them; all I get back is ingratitude--witness their irreverence, their sacrileges, their coldness and contempt for me in this Sacrament of Love." The feast and devotion to the Sacred Heart in no way replaced the feast and devotion to the Holy Eucharist.

Then in the 1930's, during what many have called the most merciless century in human history, Jesus appeared to St. Faustina, revealed his Heart to her in the context of Eucharistic adoration, and called for a feast and devotion to his Divine Mercy. In words that echo those spoken to St. Margaret Mary, he said: "The flames of mercy are burning Me. I desire to pour them out upon human souls. Oh, what pain they cause Me when they do not want to accept them!" (#1074). And he complained: "Oh, how painful it is to Me that souls so seldom unite themselves to Me in Holy Communion. I wait for souls, and they are indifferent toward Me. I love them tenderly and sincerely, and they distrust Me. I want to lavish My graces on them, and they do not want to accept them" (#1447). The feast and devotion to Divine Mercy in no way replaced the feasts and devotion to the Holy Eucharist and the Sacred Heart.

Think for a moment: what is the greatest obstacle to holiness? Our natural response is to think of our temptations and sins. But Jesus told St. Faustina it was something else: "My child, know that the greatest obstacles to holiness are discouragement and an exaggerated anxiety. These will deprive you of the ability to practice virtue. All temptations united together ought not disturb your interior peace, not even momentarily. Sensitiveness and discouragement are the fruits of self-love. You should not become discouraged, but strive to make My love reign in place of your self-love. Have confidence, My child. Do not lose heart in coming for pardon, for I am always ready to forgive you" (#1488).

Dis-cour-agement. The center of that word comes from the Latin word "cor" or "heart." When we become discouraged we lose heart. To have courage we need only turn to the Heart of Jesus. He gives his Heart to us in the Eucharist where he is present Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity, including his Heart. This is the new heart that God promised through the prophet Ezekiel (see chapters 11 and 36). God replaces our sin-hardened hearts with the Heart of his Son when we receive him in Holy Communion.

This Heart transforms our hearts so that we can be merciful as Jesus is merciful. We let go of resentments and past hurts. We pray, with merciful hearts, for the conversion of all who have hurt us and for all sinners. We pray that God's will may be done: that every soul may accept the knowledge of the truth of God's love and be saved. This is the prayer that Jesus taught his disciples and us, the Our Father. We pray to forgive as we have been forgiven by Divine Mercy. We pray that God's will--"which is Love and Mercy itself"--may be done on earth as it is done in heaven. Amen.