13 May 2014
"God grants graces through the Immaculate Heart of Mary."~ Blessed Jacinta Marto of Fatima
"My Immaculate Heart will be your refuge and the Way that will lead you to God."
~ Our Lady to Sister Maria Lucia of the Immaculate Heart
ST PAUL EXHORTS US: "Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold on to the traditions which you have learned." 2 Thessalonians 2:14
Tuesday, May 13, 2014
Thursday, May 8, 2014
Joy, Liberty & Peace of Heart
It is extraordinary what precautions it is necessary to
take in the world, to avoid offending a friend. Men are so sensitive, that
often a single expression of ill-humour is enough to make them forget twenty,
thirty, forty years of service. A single word, spoken unseasonably, sometimes
breaks the strongest friendship.
It is not so with Jesus Christ. It seems incredible, but
nevertheless it is beyond dispute, that we cannot possibly have a friend more
grateful than He is. We must not imagine that He is capable of breaking
friendship with us for a slight ingratitude. He sees all our weaknesses, and
bears with incredible goodness all the miseries of those He loves. He forgets
them, and appears not to perceive them. His compassion goes so far as to give
comfort to those souls who are too much afflicted at them. He does not desire
that our fear of displeasing Him should go so far as to disturb us and torment
our minds. He would have us avoid the smallest faults; but He does not even
wish that we should be disquieted at great ones: He desires that joy, liberty
and peace of heart should be the eternal portion of those that truly love Him.
~ Jean Croiset, Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Part I Chapter 3
Friday, May 2, 2014
Rapturous, blissful, intoxicating love
The perfect union in heaven of our hearts with the heart
of Jesus is a mystery which we believe here below, but cannot understand. The
kingdom of Christ, which on earth embraces all who suffer and strive for His
cause, will not cease in heaven; there, however, combat will give place to the
victor’s crown, and the Church militant will become the Church triumphant. King
of the kingdom of the blessed is Christ. His heart is the heart of the Church
triumphant. His heart and the hearts of His followers will be but one heart. Of
course, each of the blessed will have his own body and his own physical heart;
he will also have his own soul endowed with intelligence and free will. But all
beatific knowledge and all beatific love will have its source and origin in
Christ, just as all grace which we pilgrims receive here below is vital energy
from the vine which is Christ. Even in heaven the blessed are not merely
individuals existing for themselves alone, but constitute there, even as here,
the mystical body of Christ, with this difference, however, that in heaven the
union of all with each other and with Christ is absolutely perfect. The
sentiments of Christ are the sentiments of each individual, nor does the least
obstacle mar such conformity. These sentiments are the purest, most ardent love
of God, not a love of sacrifice nor of suffering for there is nothing to be
sacrificed or suffered, but only rapturous, blissful, intoxicating love of God.
All the flames of this love have their origin in the heart of Jesus, and in
union with the love of the heart of Jesus they constitute the worship of heaven
that endures without ceasing from day to day, from hour to hour. How long will
this union of hearts with the heart of Jesus endure? Forever!
~ Christian Pesch, S.J., Our Best Friend [Unser bester
Freund: Erwägungen für den Herz-Jesu-Monat] translated
from the German by Bernard A. Hausmann, S.J. (Milwaukee, The Bruce Publishing
Company, 1953), pp. 219-220.