Are you a cradle Catholic, born into a Christian family? Has God warmed your heart with spiritual experiences on many occasions? Has he dealt generously with you in this way?
If your answer is yes you are in very grave spiritual danger as am I and anyone born into a kind of spiritual prosperity. In Scripture so often the people who fit this description are the people too arrogant to realize their extreme poverty before God so as to open their deepest heart to his purifying graces. Religious people are tempted to pretend as though they have it made, that all they have to do is follow along with the exterior dictates of their religion, and they will reach salvation. The reality is that God calls us to something much deeper, to a realization of our radicalized poverty and wretchedness before God. If we don’t accept this reality we put our souls in grave danger as the experience of spiritual poverty is the only means of receiving the riches of God’s grace.
The pride of the lukewarm religious heart is subtle, perhaps hardly noticeable at times, but more dangerous than anything experienced by people who weren’t born into a religious environment to nourish them. To whom much is given much is expected and those given more graces will be judged with less leniency.
Religion is a very good thing, but lets not be blind to the very challenging circumstances it places us under. Temptations to pride and hypocrisy can easily attract our fallen hearts when we imagine ourselves to be rich and affluent in the spiritual life when in fact we are far from living up to the call of the Cross and Resurrection of Christ, when in fact we are “wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked” (Revelation 3:16-17).
Come Holy Spirit and fill the hearts of your faithful people, and kindle in them the fire of your love. Send forth your Spirit Lord and they shall be created, and you will renew the face of the earth.
A couple of days ago I was getting a strong spiritual message from the Blessed Mother, a message of comfort and assurance in the midst of uncertainty. I was sitting at the kitchen table looking out the windows as a wonderful afternoon rain fell. I was looking at a large concrete statue of the Blessed Mother, and I remember thinking how beautiful she looked. And not only that! She was also smiling. In the moment I made a mental note that I had never seen a statue of the Blessed Mother smile like that. It seems like very few statues have smiling expressions, they all usually have a serious or solemn sort of look. But other than that I didn’t think anything of it thinking that the expression was just peculiar to that statue.
Job’s friends saw him suffering as Christ and said he needed to be more righteous. Even if it was true that he had brought this suffering upon himself, the friends of Job were harsh beyond words. They thought if they bombarded their friend with many words his eyes would suddenly open, and he would see that he had committed some horrific sin, no matter that he solemnly swore before God that he hadn’t done anything like that. His friends didn’t really think he was guilty, they just didn’t want to believe that God would make an innocent man suffer that much, they wanted to believe that God’s way was the easy way, the way of riches and of honor. Isn’t that why we crucified Christ, not because we denied he was of supernatural origin, but rather because he wasn’t willing to use his supernatural power to give us what we wanted, which for the Jews was the defeat of all their enemies and reclamation of the promised land. They wanted Christ to be a general.
O most provident guardian of the Holy Family, defend the chosen children of Jesus Christ. Most beloved father, dispel the evil of falsehood and sin. Our most mighty liberator, graciously assist us from heaven in our struggle with the powers of darkness. And just as you once saved the Child Jesus from mortal danger, so now defend God’s Holy Church from the snares of her enemies and from all adversity. Shield each one of us by your constant protection, so that, supported by your example and your help, we may be able to live a virtuous life, to die a holy death, and to obtain eternal happiness in heaven.
Early one afternoon my wife had looked through our store of keepsakes, the kind that we went through and really decided that we wanted to keep. Its contents make up a somewhat decent-sized old-fashioned-looking chest. She found a frame that my sister, her Confirmation sponsor and college friend, had give to her at some point. The words, written in beautiful calligraphy, read thus: “For I know well the plans I have in mind for you, says the LORD, plans for your welfare, not for woe! Plans to give you a future full of hope.” This was an important frame to her and to me as well, but it had been stowed away ever since we made a big move a couple of years ago. That day it surfaced as its message would be useful in communicating something God wanted to say to us.
The LORD answer you in time of distress; the name of the God of Jacob defend you!
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