5 March 2013 3rd Week of Lent -- Tuesday Jesus scolds His disciples “He comes to his disciples, and finds them asleep; ... he said to Peter, ‘So, you could not stay awake with me one hour? ... the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak’.” (Mt 26:40-41) The reproach surprised the three Apostles. “... they knew not what to answer him” (Mk 14:40). It especially embittered St Peter, who earlier had promised fidelity and constancy. The reason Jesus addressed him personally. “Simon, I, thy master, have prayed and endured an extreme agony, you have not the courage to watch one hour with me in prayer, although I expressly commanded you to do so. ... Watch and pray, that you enter not into temptation.” (cf Mk 14:38; cf Mt 26:41) Spiritual lukewarmness is a very dangerous state. Whoever is lukewarm falls into fatal delusions. Intending to do well, and like the Apostles, liberal in grand promises, he falsely equates willing with doing. As if we have the strength to work out our salvation. Jesus says, “The spirit is indeed willing, but the flesh is weak” (Mt 26:41). That is why he immediately adds, 'Watch and pray'. Be always on your guard, always distrustful of self, always armed with prayer. If not, we will certainly fall under temptation, open to our enemies. Jesus firmly meets tortures and death, showing the powerful effects of that long and fervent prayer to his Father. We also see, in the shameful flight of the Apostles at the first hint of danger, the loss to the soul which neglects to seek God in fervent prayer. From prayer we draw the strength needed in times of difficulty. “... leaving them, he went again and prayed ... Then he comes to his disciples, and said to them, ‘Sleep now, take your rest; the hour has come for the Son of Man to be betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us go; he who will betray me is here.’” (Mk 14:41-2) Ref: Cf “Practical Meditations” by a Father of the Society of Jesus, 1964, p94-6 “Father, I have sinned against you ...” (Lk 15:18) During Lent, the Church ponders these words with particular emotion, since it is the time when the Church more profoundly desires to convert herself to Christ. ‘Without these words there is no conversion in all its interior meaning.’ Without these words, ‘Father, I have sinned’, man cannot truly enter into the Mystery of the Resurrection of Christ, so as to obtain the fruits of Redemption and Grace from them. Those key words show man’s great interior openness to God: ‘Father, I have sinned against you.’ If it is true that sin in a certain sense shuts man off from God, it is likewise true that ‘remorse’ for sins opens up all the greatness and majesty of God, his fatherhood above all, to man’s conscience. Man remains shut to God so long as the words, ‘Father, I have sinned against you’, are absent from his lips, above all, ... from his conscience, from his ‘heart’. Being converted to Christ, finding the interior power of His Cross and Resurrection, the full truth of human existence ‘in Christ’, is possible only with this form: ‘Father, I have sinned.’ And only at the cost of them. In Lent, the Church labors above all that everyone may blame himself / herself for sins before God alone; and may consequently accept the salvific power of the pardon in Christ’s Suffering and Resurrection. Ref: cf Pope John Paul II, “Prayers and Devotions”, 1994, pp124-5 The opposition from the good We must always pray for peace in the Church and for Christians of every country. However, we should not be surprised or frightened if there is resistance to the teaching of Christ which we want to spread, a hostility in the form of defamation, calumnies. God will help us to reap abundant fruits from such situations. On arriving in Rome, the Jews living there, referring to the infant Church, told St Paul: “We know that everywhere it is spoken against” (Acts 28:22). After twenty centuries we continue to see how in various countries thousands of good Christians, priests and lay persons, have suffered martyrdom because of their faith. They have been discriminated against for their beliefs, or kept out of public offices or teaching positions on account of their Catholicism; or encounter difficulties in securing a Christian education for their children. It is difficult to understand calumny or persecution at a time when one hears so much about tolerance, understanding, fellowship and peace. But the attacks become more difficult to understand when they come from good men, when a Christian persecutes, no matter how, another Christian, or a brother, his brother. Our Lord prepared his own for these inevitable times when the enemies of Christ are not pagans, but brothers in the Faith who think that by their actions they would be doing “a service to God” (cf Jn 16:2). This ‘opposition from the good’, an expression coined by the founder of ‘Opus Dei’, St Josemaria Escrivá to describe what he experienced so painfully, is a trial God sometimes permits. It is particularly painful for the Christian victim. The calumniators are usually motivated by human passions that can distort good judgment and complicate the clear intention of men who profess the same faith as those they attack, and who make up the same People of God. At times jealousies supervene; rash allegations that may arise from envy, and make it possible to regard as evil the good that others are doing. There can also be a ‘tunnel vision’ of dogmatism that refuses to recognize for others the right to think differently in matters left by God to the free judgment of men. (cf J Orlandis, “The Eight Beatitudes”, p150) The Christian who wants to be faithful to Christ must learn to pardon, make amends and act with rectitude of intention, all the time focused on Christ. “Don’t expect people’s applause ... sometimes you musn’t even expect other people and institutions, who like you are working for Christ, to understand you. Seek only the glory of God and while loving everyone, don’t worry if there are some who do not comprehend what it is you are doing.” (St Josemaria Escrivá, “The Forge”, 255) “Turn to our Lady, the Mother, Daughter, and Spouse of God, and our Mother, and ask her to obtain more graces for you from the Blessed Trinity -- the grace of faith, of hope, of love and of contrition, so that when it seems that a harsh dry wind is blowing in your life, threatening the flowers of your soul, they will not wither, and neither will those of your brothers.” (St Josemaria Escrivá, “The Forge”, 227) Ref: Cf Francis Fernandez, “In Conversation with God”, 4:589-592 • Our Lady of Good Succor, at Nancy, in Lorraine. This Madonna, it is believed, enabled Rene, Duke of Lorraine, to gain a victory over Charles the Bold, the last Duke of Burgundy.—(Triple Couronne, n. 55.) “Catholic Gems or Treasures of the Church” Historical Calendar (http://www.bethlehemobserver.com) • Our Lady of Good Aid/Help. Nancy, France; Montreal. 1657. (www.marylinks.org/Mary-Calendar.htm) • Our Lady of Good Help, Montreal Canada (1657). (http://www/divinewill.org/feastsofourlady.html); (www.iskandar.com/ourlady/ourladyfeasts.html) • Our Lady of Good Aid (Nancy, Lorraine). (maryfest.htm / www.starharbor.com/santiago/m_feasts.html)