How many people have made worldly glory the mainspring of all their actions? If their names are remembered, “what do they gain by being praised where they are not, while they are tormented where they are now?” (St Augustine)
How different was our Lord! He sought only the glory of his Father throughout his whole life. He died the victim of love, blasphemed and despised; but the greater his humiliation, the greater his glory which began in the tomb. “His sepulchre shall be glorious.” (Isaiah) Since then it is the object of honor and veneration of pilgrims from every part of the world.
Thus also will be glorified the faithful servants of our Lord. Like their Master, they have trodden under foot the glories of the world, and sought in all, the greater glory of God. Unknown and despised of men, their sepulchre will also be glorious in the great day of the resurrection. They, too will leave it to receive a crown of everlasting glory.
A great prince, on his deathbed, exclaimed -- ‘Today, I have treasures, palaces, and an army at my disposal; tomorrow what will be mine? Perhaps nothing but the horrors of the tomb.’ Such thoughts overwhelm the dying who have placed all their happiness in wealth and power.
Our Lord, whose whole life is poverty and voluntary obedience, received in the tomb fullness of life, power of judging all men, and the empire of the universe. Thus also his faithful servants, who, after his example and ‘for his name’s sake’, have chosen poverty and self-renunciation, will be glorified.
How unhappy is the fate of the man of pleasure at the moment of death. He has ever before his eyes the awful thought that terrified and finally converted St Augustine: ‘A few moments of pleasure, and an eternity of torment.’
The faithful disciple’s deathbed is different! He can say with his Lord, “It is consummated; the sacrifice that I made of worldly pleasures and all that it has cost me; You have turned into joy and has compassed me with gladness” (Psalm).
He can conclude, “I have fought a good fight; I have ran the course; I have kept the faith” (2 Tim 4:7). Laid up for me is a crown of justice which the just Judge will render to me on that day.
If we do not forget these truths, we shall count as nothing the sacrifice of every earthly enjoyment. We shall secure eternal bodily enjoyment in proportion to our sacrifices.
Ref: cf “Practical Meditations” by a Father of the Society of Jesus, 1964, pp 196-8
Seeing Christ in the events of our life
The real tragedy for a Christian begins when he can no longer see Jesus in his life; when because of sin or pride or lukewarmness, the horizon is clouded over; when things are done as if Jesus were not beside him, as if the Lord had never risen from the dead.
Beside Christ, when faith is with us, our days are enriched. With Jesus by our side, pain and illness are converted into a treasure that lasts beyond death. The matter of living with those around us becomes a whole world of possibilities for doing good: opportunities for attention, encouragement, cordiality, prayers for others. Our efforts alone no matter how earnest do not suffice; we need God for them to bear fruit.
We should pray a lot to Our Lady asking her to help us to discover Our Lord amidst all the events of our lives; so we may be able to say very often, “It is the Lord!” (Jn 21:7) And this, too, whatever the circumstances, be it a case of suffering or of joy. By Christ’s side, we will be apostles in the middle of the world, in all conditions and situations. (cf F Carvajal, “Lukewarmness -- The Devil in Disguise”)
We don’t know how or when but apostolic effort always bears fruit, although oftentimes we do not see it. Our Lord asks from us Christians the capacity for patient waiting as he found in the fishermen. He expects us to be constant in our personal apostolate with friends and acquaintances, never to give up on anybody as being impossible.
Ref: cf F Fernandez, “In Conversation with God”, 2:323-6
Christ is Everyone’s Life
Jesus Christ is the Chief way for the Church. He himself is our way ‘to the Father’s house’ and is the way to each man. On this way leading from Christ to man, on which Christ unites himself with each man, nobody can halt the Church. This is an exigency of man’s temporal and eternal welfare.
Out of regard for Christ and in view of the mystery that constitutes the Church’s own life, the Church cannot remain insensible to whatever serves man’s true welfare any more than she can remain indifferent to what threatens it.
In various passages in its documents the Second Vatican Council has expressed the Church’s fundamental solicitude that life in ‘the world should conform more to man’s surpassing dignity’ in all its aspects so as to make that life ‘ever more human’.
This is the solicitude of Christ himself, the good Shepherd of all men. In the name of this solicitude, as we read in the Council’s Pastoral Constitution, “the Church must in no way be confused with the political community, nor bound to any political system. She is at once a sign and a safeguard of the transcendence of the human person.”
What is in question here is man in all his truth, in his full magnitude. We are not dealing with the ‘abstract’ man but the real ‘each’ man, for each one is included in the mystery of the Redemption and with each one Christ has united himself for ever through this mystery.
Ref: cf “Prayers and Devotions from Pope John Paul II”, p252
Our Lady
“Marvel at the courage of Mary -- at the foot of the cross, in the greatest of human sorrow (there is no sorrow like hers) filled with fortitude.
“And ask her for that same fortitude, so that you, too, will know how to remain close to the cross.”
Ref: cf St Josemaria Escrivá, "The Way", 508)
“Mary, teacher of the sacrifice that is hidden and silent. See her, nearly always in the background cooperating with her Son: she knows and remains silent.” (Ibid, Op cit, 509)
Our Lady of Charity, in the Abbey of the Feuillants, seven leagues from Toulouse. It is said that this image has several times wept. — Triple Couronne, n. 34. (“Catholic Gems or Treasures of the Church” Historical Calendar; http://www.bethlehemobserver.com)
Our Lady of Charity (near Toulouse, France). (maryfest.htm / www.starharbor.com/santiago/m_feasts.html)
Our Lady of Charity. Toulouse, France; Cobre, Cuba. (www.marylinks.org/Mary-Calendar.htm)
Our Lady of Charity, Cobre, Cuba. (www.iskandar.com/ourlady/ourladyfeasts.html)
Interior Life of the Blessed Virgin (Marianist Missal). (maryfest.htm / www.starharbor.com/santiago/m_feasts.html); (www.marylinks.org/Mary-Calendar.htm)
Joys of Our Lady (Moveable feast: Monday after Low Sunday [11 April]) -- (maryfest.htm / www.starharbor.com/santiago/m_feasts.html); (www.marylinks.org/Mary-Calendar.htm)
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