Wednesday of the Third Week of Advent
“For greater things you were born.” (Ven. Mother Luisita)
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 16th Mt. 7: 18-23 Jesus said to them: “Go tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind regain their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have the good news proclaimed to them.”
Part 1: Meditations on the Spiritual Exercises… (Author unknown)
Part 2: BE HOLY AS YOUR HEAVENLY FATHER IS HOLY! By Fr. Ed Broom, OMV
PART 1: Taken from Meditations on the Spiritual Exercises… (Author unknown)
The Incarnation consists in this, that God has united the creature to Himself in a new way. The Word becomes Incarnate to recall men to the love of God. Consider that creatures, instead of leading man to God, usurped all the affections of his heart. What does the Divine Word do to restore this heart to the empire of charity—to the love of God His Creator? Because man is under the dominion of his senses, He appears in a sensible form; because man is smitten with the love of creatures, He makes Himself one of them, He becomes man, that He may more irresistibly captivate the human heart.
He gives the first example of the love He asks: “You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, with your whole soul, with your whole mind, and with your whole strength.” His whole life is an example of devotion and service to His Father. Reminding us that there is not a single moment of our lives that does not belong to God.
Recall again the life on earth of the Word Incarnate. See Him bestowing on our redemption all His thoughts, all His affections, all His works, His humanity, His entire divinity—and say, has He not also fulfilled the precept of charity in its full extent towards man?
Finally, recall that His Incarnation depends on the consent of His creature. God willed that men should owe Jesus Christ, and with Him their redemption, to the free-will of the Blessed Virgin. Conceive, then, a great respect and confidence for the Mother of God, and never forget that the Word Incarnate having only come into the world through Mary, it is only through Mary that we can go to Him.
The Word became man to bring men back to the knowledge of God. Consider that the Incarnation is the plainest proof of the Divine perfections. It reveals the grandeur and wisdom of God to invent this wonderful union of Divine and human nature for His glory and our salvation. His holiness, that man’s offense could only be repaired by the satisfaction of God Himself in the Person of the Son Incarnate. His mercy, which instead of abandoning guilty man to eternal damnation, takes pity on him and saves him. His love, which was not content with the gifts bestowed on man in the order of creation, but desires to present him with God the Son as his Savior and Source of life in the Blessed Trinity.
PART 2: BE HOLY AS YOUR HEAVENLY FATHER IS HOLY! By Fr. Ed Broom, OMV
All of us are called to become saints. How do we know? Jesus commanded us: “Be holy as your heavenly Father is holy.” In other words: Become a saint! Most saints have not been officially canonized, but are anonymous, unknown except by God alone.
Given that this is a serious command given by Jesus Himself, to be holy, to become a saint, let us highlight ten of the most salient notes or characteristics of the saints. This will serve to motivate each and every one of us to become who God has called us to be—a saint!
1. ANTITHESIS OF SAINTLINESS: SIN. Let us start with the negative. Saints have an abhorrence; they truly detest the one major evil in the world—the reality of sin. Modern culture glamorizes and even promotes sin; the saints fight against it. The motto of Saint Dominic Savio for his First Holy Communion was the following immortal assertion: DEATH RATHER THAN SIN!
2. PRAYER! It is absolutely impossible to come across and read the life of any saint who did not take their prayer life seriously and spend sizable blocks of time dedicated to prayer, which is union and friendship with God. (Saint Teresa of Avila) Face it, we can all improve our prayer lives; we can pray more and we can always pray better. May the Holy Spirit enlighten and inspire us to upgrade our prayer-life in our pursuit of holiness.
3. HUMILITY. Saints are truly humble. By humility we mean the following: saints attribute all the good they do to God—the origin, the author and the end of all good. When they are complimented on any good done, almost spontaneously the saint responds: Thanks be to God!
4. HUNGER FOR HOLINESS. An authentic saint has a real hunger and thirst for exactly that—holiness, to become a saint. If you like, the saint lives out the first verse of Psalm 41: “As the deer yearns for running waters, so my soul yearns for you, O Lord, my God.” A saint admits that they are not a saint, but really longs to be a saint one day. This longing, this yearning indeed is half the battle for attaining the crown of holiness, the triumph of winning the crown of saintliness. Many yearn for money, power, pleasure, success, and possessions. Not so for the saint. They want to love God fully, totally and unreservedly. They long to be the saint that God has called them to be!
5. CHARITY. The saint is motivated to assimilate and carry out in word and deed the greatest of all the Commandments—the Command to love both God and neighbor. If you want to see a graphic image of charity then lift up your eyes to Jesus crucified, Jesus hanging from the cross, and you have a clear image of charity. We are called to love God totally and to love our neighbor as ourselves. On one occasion, after enormous accomplishments, Jesus appeared to Saint Thomas Aquinas and asked the saint what gift he desired most. Immediately Aquinas responded: “Lord, grant me the grace to love you more and more each day.” Saint John of the Cross asserted: “In the twilight of our existence we will be judged on love.” Saint Frances de Sales adds this: “The measure of love is to love without measure.”
6. ZEAL FOR THE SALVATION OF SOULS. Two saints met, one a youngster, the other a priest. The youngster looked up and saw on the wall a few words written in Latin and he asked the priest what those words were and what they meant. The priest responded by saying that those words were his motto and they were: “Give me souls and take all the rest away.” The priest was Saint John Bosco; the youngster was Saint Dominic Savio. An authentic saint loves God and loves what God loves—the salvation of immortal souls. One soul is worth more than all of creation in the natural world. The reason for the excruciating pain that Jesus suffered in His Passion and the outpouring of His most Precious Blood was precisely this: to save immortal souls for all eternity. The stigmata for fifty years of Saint Padre Pio, the 13-18 hours daily in the Confessional in the life of the Cure of Ars, the heroic sacrifices of the little children of Fatima, the victimhood of Saint Faustina—all had one motivational reason and force: love of God, and hunger and thirst for the salvation of souls.
7. STRUGGLING SINNERS WHO RISE WHEN THEY FALL. Many have been deceived into an artificial, sugar-sweet, somewhat romantic vision of the saints as being exempt from human weaknesses and moral failures. Nothing could be further from the truth! Saints are born sinners. However, a common characteristic of the saints is that upon falling, sinners that they are, they resiliently bounce back; they return to the Lord through Confession, good will, and a firm purpose of amendment. Venerable Bruno Lanteri taught NUNC CAEPI—meaning if we fall, then we must rise immediately and trust all the more in the grace and mercy of the loving Heart of Jesus! No surprise that in the Diary of Saint Faustina, Jesus reminds us that the greatest sinner can be the greatest saint if they fully trust in the mercy of Jesus. Jesus, I trust in you! Venerable Fulton J. Sheen reminds us that the first canonized saint was a murderer, insurrectionist, and thief who hung on a cross next to Jesus on Calvary. As Sheen points out: “And he died a thief because he stole heaven.” Read and meditate upon the Parable of the Prodigal Son, that can also be termed the Parable of the Merciful Father. (Luke 15: 11-32)
8. FERVENT LOVE FOR THE SOURCE OF ALL HOLINESS: THE HOLY EUCHARIST. The ultimate source of grace, purity, strength and holiness is Jesus Himself. The most efficacious means by which we unite ourselves with Jesus in His Mystical Body is through the Sacraments. The greatest of all of the Sacraments is the Most Holy Eucharist for the simple but profound reason that the Eucharist actually is Jesus—His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity! Jesus is the Holy of Holies; He is God, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. Though it may sound banal, or trivial, or even a cliché, there is a real truism behind this one liner: “You become what you eat!” Bad eating habits can produce health problems; good eating habits can contribute to health and longevity. In a parallel but real sense when we nourish our souls with the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus with faith, devotion, fervor and love, then we start to think like Jesus, feel like Jesus, act like Jesus, become like Jesus until we can say with Saint Paul: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” (Gal. 2:20)
9. OPEN AND DOCILE TO THE HOLY SPIRIT. Father Jacques Philippe wrote a short masterpiece on this topic with the title “In the School of the Holy Spirit.” In this short but inspiring book, Father Jacques constantly reminds his readers that holiness essentially depends on one basic attitude, action, and plan of life: being docile to the Holy Spirit and His heavenly inspirations. The Consoler, Counselor, Interior Master, the Paraclete, the Sweet Guest of the Soul, the Holy Spirit speaks gently but insistently to pure, humble, and docile souls guiding them in the proper course of action that leads to holiness of life, that leads us to become the saints that we are all called and destined to become. Saint Paul reminds us: “We do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Holy Spirit intercedes for us with ineffable groans so that we can call out Abba, Father.” (Rom. 8:15, 26) It is precisely for this reason that Pope Saint John XXIII stated: “The saints are the masterpieces of the Holy Spirit.”
10. MARY AND THE SAINTS. Our Lady, Mary most holy, is the Queen of Angels, the Queen of Virgins, the Queen of Confessors, the Queen of Martyrs, the Queen and beauty of Carmel, the Queen of the most Holy Rosary, and finally Mary is Queen of all of the Angels and Saints. After he died, Saint Dominic Savio appeared bathed in heavenly glory to Saint John Bosco and asked the holy priest to guess what gave Dominic the greatest joy in his short life on earth (he died at 14 years and 11 months). It was precisely this: his great love for, as well as confidence in the Blessed Virgin Mary. Saint Dominic ended this encounter with Saint John Bosco by exhorting him to spread devotion to Mary to the greatest extent possible. Mary inspires the saints to pray fervently. Mary inspires the saints to return to God after they sin. Mary encourages the saints to love Jesus with their whole being. Mary’s presence helps the saints to avoid moral dangers. Mary’s maternal and loving presence helps the saints to move from desolation to consolation. For that reason, the saints cry out to Mary in these words: “Hail Holy Queen, Mother of mercy, our life, our sweetness and our hope.”
Our final prayer and hope is that all of you will become saints and great saints. Our hope and prayer is that all of you will one day be a very precious, resplendent and glorious jewel in the crown of Mary and contemplate and praise the Blessed Trinity for all eternity. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us so that we can attain the grace to truly become the saint that God has destined us to become for all eternity.
Copyright 2020 Oblates of the Virgin Mary
St. Peter Chanel Church, Hawaiian Gardens, CA
