Baptism finds its deepest meaning in the fact that we are bringing a new and extraordinary relationship of grace into being between God and creatures ... With this Sacrament, God’s Fatherhood is imparted in a new way, and whoever receives it acquires a fresh relationship of preference in His regard.
A condition of intimate communion with Him is actually set up which represents the overcoming of all interior alienation because of sin and, as St Paul writes, formation of a “new creation” (2 Cor 5:17).
We rejoice keenly with profound spiritual delight. Ours is the joy of the divine family. A number of new members enter to become part of the family of God; and while they acquire a new Father in Him, they also find new brethren in us, ready to receive them, with concern and exultation, into the great community of the children of God.
After His Baptism, Jesus “went about doing good works and healing all” (Acts 10:38). Baptism must be made ‘manifest in concrete living’, with luminous and adequate testimony.
“Through baptism into his death, we were buried with him so, just as Christ was raised from the dead ... we, too might live a new life.” (cf Rom 6:4) Let us ask the Lord to “strengthen us inwardly through the power of his Spirit” (Eph 3:16), to live always for his greater glory. Amen.
Ref: Cf “Prayers and Devotions from Pope John Paul II”, 1984, p55
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”, 1984, 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.” (Cf St Josemaria Escrivá, “The Way”, 509)
The Value of Ordinary Daily Activity
Consciousness that human labor is participation in God’s work should, as the Second Vatican Council teaches, “permeate ‘ordinary daily activities’ as well. When men and women work to gain a living for themselves and their families and carry out their activities in such a way as to do proper service to society as well, they may rightly maintain that they are extending the Creator’s work through their work. ... making themselves useful to their brethren and a personal contribution to accomplishing God’s providential plan in history.”
So it is necessary for this Christian spirituality of labor to become the common heritage of all. There is need for this spirituality to demonstrate, especially in our time, that maturity demanded by tensions and anxieties in minds and hearts.
The knowledge that man participates in the work of creation through his labor is the deepest motivation for starting out in various sectors. “The faithful”, we read in the constitution “Lumen Gentium”, “should therefore recognize the intimate nature of all creation, its value, and how it is ordained to the praise of God; and they must help each other to live holier lives and also undertake appropriate secular activities, so that the world may be imbued with the spirit of Christ and more effectively attain its goal in justice, in charity and in peace.
“Therefore, with their abilities in worldly disciplines and through their activities, they make a valuable contribution to created goods inwardly elevated by the grace of Christ enjoying progress through human labor, technology and the culture of civilization, according to the Creator’s dispositions and in the light of his Word.”
Ref: Cf Pope John Paul II, “Prayers and Devotions”, 1994, pp390-91
• Our Lady of the Star at ‘Villa Viciosa’, in Portugal, so-called from a star which a shepherd saw shining where the church is built. — Triple Couronne, n. 17. (“Catholic Gems or Treasures of the Church” Historical Calendar; www.bethlehemobserver.com)
• Our Lady of the Star (‘Villa Viciosa’, Portugal). (www/divinewill.org/feastofourlady.htm); (www.iskandar.com/ourlady/ourladyfeasts.html)
• “Nossa Senhora da estrala.” / “Our Lady of the Star”, “Villa-Vicioza”, Portugal. (www.marylinks.org/Mary-Calendar.htm)
• Our Lady of the Star (“Villa-Vicioza”, Portugal). (maryfest.htm / www.starharbor.com/santiago/m_feasts.html)
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