God’s Mercy is Greater: the Teaching of St. Therese Of Lisieux on Purgatory

The following originally appeared at

http://www.franciscan-sfo.org/ap/litfwrpu.htm .

“God’s Mercy is Greater!”

THE TEACHING OF ST. THERESE OF LISIEUX

ON PURGATORY

by Father Dr. Hubert van Dijk, ORC¹

Doctor of the Church for the third millennium

St. Therese of Lisieux, who was declared Doctor of the Church by Pope John Paul II on October 19, 1997, felt the calling in the monastery to teach others and wanted to be a teacher (docteur)¹ Early on, God revealed the mysteries of His Love to her. She writes about this: “Ah! Had the learned who spent their life in study come to me, undoubtedly they would have been astonished to see a child of fourteen understand perfection’s secrets, secrets all their knowledge cannot reveal because to possess them one has to be poor in spirit!” ²

In his apostolic letter Divini Amoris Scientia, published when St. Therese was declared Doctor of the Church, the Holy Father says that one should not look for a scientific revelation of God’s mysteries. “Thus we can rightly recognize in the Saint of Lisieux the charism of a Doctor of the Church, because of the gift of the Holy Spirit she received for living and expressing her experience faith, and because of her particular understanding of the mystery of Christ… That assimilation was certainly favored by the most singular natural gifts, but it was also evidently something prodigious, due to a charism of wisdom from the Holy Spirit.”³

Her writings offer an abundance of ideas concerning practically every field in theology and spirituality, a multitude which even a hundred years after her death bas been far from exhausted. As the popes repeatedly express: Therese of Lisieux is a gift to the Church. Before the year 2000, she was declared Doctor of the Church, becoming the third woman amongst the thirty-three recognized Doctors of the Church. She died young. Not only is she the youngest of all, but also the best known, loved, and read! Already she has given the Church a lot, and in the dawn of a new millennium, she will continue to bless the faithful with her many gifts. Thus, she is also known as “Doctor of the Church of the third millennium.“

“One does not need to go to Purgatory “

Little Therese’s theology is a theology that springs from life, a theology of experience. She received a fervent Catholic upbringing at home, in her parish community, as well as at the school of the Benedictine nuns in Lisieux and thus, she was familiar with the teaching of Purgatory. Being lead by-the Holy Spirit, thoughts, notions, and ideas developed which finally became, “The teaching of the Little Flower on Purgatory.”⁴

The common teaching within the Church is that Purgatory can hardly be avoided. While still only a novice, the saint commented about this with one of the sisters,  Sr. Maria Philomena, who believed in the near impossibility of going to heaven without passing through Purgatory:

You do not have enough trust. You have too much fear before the good God. I can assure you that He is grieved over this. You should not fear Purgatory because of the suffering there, but should instead ask that you not deserve to go there in order to please God, Who so reluctantly imposes this punishment. As soon as you try to please Him in everything and have an unshakable trust He purifies you every moment in His love and He lets no sin remain. And then you can be sure that you will not have to go to Purgatory.⁵

She even said that we would offend God if we didn’t trust enough that we would get to heaven right after dying. When she found out that her novices talked occasionally that they would probably have to expect to be in Purgatory, she corrected them saying: “Oh! How you grieve me! You do a great injury to God in believing you’re going to Purgatory. When we love, we can’t go there.”⁶ Now, this is a new doctrine, but only for those who don’t know God, who are not childlike, who don’t trust. It is so correct to see things this way. It is true that God will judge us at one point, but He is always and first our Father Who… suffers when He has to punish His child and sees its suffering. The child should do His will just out of love, and not to avoid punishment. And this really means that God does not want Purgatory! He allows that His children suffer, but only as if He had to look away.⁷

If St. Therese is correct that one does not need to be in Purgatory because God Himself does not want this and would love to help us, the thought that Purgatory can be avoided is suddenly not so far-fetched anymore. But first there is the problem of the . aforementioned opinion which says that only few will avoid Purgatory. This is confirmed by great saints and mystics like St. John of the Cross who says, “Only a small number of souls achieve perfect love”⁸ (perfect love is necessary to go straight to heaven). St. Teresa of Avila also had the experience that only few will be able to avoid Purgatory.⁹ St. John Vianney said, “It is definite that only a few chosen ones do not go to Purgatory and the suffering there that one must. endure, exceeds our imagination.”¹⁰

One also has to take into consideration that even practicing Christians are convinced that even the good and faithful and those consecrated to God will have to be exposed to purification in Purgatory for a certain amount of time. The reason for this is always the same: “It is not easy to avoid Purgatory. No one is a saint, and I will certainly have to spend some time there myself.” They add to this that “God is just” or “we certainly deserve this.”

Therefore, it is even more amazing what St. Therese has to say. Once she encouraged her novice, Sr. Marie de la Trinire to have the faith that it was possible even for her to get to heaven right away. She wondered “If I fail even in: the smallest things, “ may I still hope to get straight to heaven?” St. Therese, who knew well the weaknesses of her novice, replied: “Yes! God is so good. He will know how He can come and get you. But despite this, try to be faithful, so that He does not wait in vain for your love.”¹¹

God is Father rather than Judge.

Once St. Therese had a confrontation regarding this topic with Sr. Marie Febronia, who not only was sixty-seven years old but also was sub-prioress. She had heard that St. Therese encouraged the novices to believe that they could go straight to heaven. She did not like this as she considered this kind of confidence presumptuous, and thus she reproached St. Therese. St. Therese tried lovingly and calmly to explain to Sr. Febronia her point of view but with no success as Sr. Febronia clung to belief. For St. Therese God was more Father than Judge, and she took the liberty of finally responding, “My sister, if you look for the justice of God you will get it. The soul will receive from God exactly what she desires.”

The year had not passed when, in January 1892, Sr. M. Febronia together with other sisters fell prey to the flu and died. Three months later Sr. Therese had a dream which she related to her Mother Prioress and which was then documented: “O my Mother, my Sr. M Febronia came to me last night and asked that we should pray for het:. She is in Purgatory, surely because she had trusted too little in the mercy of the good Lord. Through her imploring behavior and her profound looks, it seemed she wanted to say, You were right. I am now delivered up to the full justice of God but it is my fault. If I had listened to you I would not be here now.”¹²

St. Therese’s “doctrine” in 7 key words

1. Purgatory became a rule rather than the exception.

An infinite number of souls who suffer in Purgatory and for whom the Church prays daily after consecration did not need to go there. If we think in human terms, God does not wish for us to need Purgatory. God does not put us here on earth, where we are tested and are suffering after the fall, only to let us suffer again–and much worse–in Purgatory. Everyone receives enough graces in order to go straight to God after passing the trials on earth. However, Purgatory is an emergency entry to Heaven for those who have wasted their time. However, what God considered the exception became the rule, and the rule–to go straight to heaven–became the exception.

2. To cope with the “inevitable” is a grave error.

Since God does not really want Purgatory, He does not want it for me either! But then I also have to not want it! Nobody would expose themselves to the danger of Purgatory by living a mediocre and–as is the case so often today–a sinful life. If they only thought of the intense sufferings in Purgatory. In this regard, the mystics unanimously say that the least suffering in Purgatory is much greater than the greatest suffering here on earth! The reason for this is that once in Purgatory, one does not go through the time of God’s Mercy but of God’s Justice. Here, the Lord’s word applies: “1 tell you, you will not get out until you have paid the very last copper’ (Lk 12:59). The many who carelessly say, “I will probably spend some time there,” are gravely wrong. Nobody just spends some time there, one has to suffer there like one has never suffered nor could have suffered while on earth. One often even suffers a long time there also. If the Poor Souls in Purgatory had known on earth what to expect in eternity, Purgatory would have remained empty.

3. Purgatory is a waste of time.

This is what St. Therese says, “I know that of myself I would not merit even to enter that place of expiation since only holy souls can have entrance there. But I also know that the Fire of Love is more sanctifying than is the tire of Purgatory. I know that Jesus cannot desire useless sufferings for us, and that He would not inspire the longings I feel unless He wanted to grant them.”¹³ It is true that Purgatory is a wonderful grace, for if needed, without the purification in Purgatory we would not go to Heaven, and the work of art which God intended and created us to be would not be completed. But St. Therese is right: at the moment of our death we already have our place in Heaven. Afterwards, there is no growing in grace anymore. Whoever does not go through Purgatory does not miss anything.

4. We need a more positive image of God.

We already know that St. Therese told her novices that they offended God when they thought they would go to Purgatory. That is a very shocking statement: for if this is correct millions of Christians are offending God or at least hurt Him. And yet this is the case. They are focused only on themselves, thinking–not without reason–that they deserve Purgatory. They do not notice God Who is by their side and would love to help them so much. The fact that we fear Purgatory so much also has to do with a rather negative image that we have of God. We, Christians of the 20th Century, were like so many, raised with the image of a strict God, anxious to punish us as often as we deserve it. This thinking goes back to heresies like Jansenism. Quietism, or Calvinism. ¹⁴

5. Love banishes fear

The question of whether Heaven will follow right after death is a question of trust. God does not need our merits in order to take us straight to Him but He needs all of our trust. Or the other way around–it is not -our sins that can prevent God from giving us this grace but rather our lack of trust. Therefore, we must draw the conclusion that everything depends solely on trust. There is no trust without perfect love. And vice versa, there is no love without trust.

And this is exactly what the Apostle John writes in his first letter, “In this is love perfected with us, that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as He is so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and he who fears is not perfected in love” (1 Jn. 4:17-18).

This text enlightens our topic very much. Judgment Day is the day of our death. Whoever achieves perfect love at the moment of their death sees God as so merciful and generous that they cannot believe in punishment in Purgatory. We are dealing with the same kind of grace in the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick. St. Thomas Aquinas teaches us that this Sacrament has as its real fruit the wiping out of punishment due to our sins.¹⁵ After those who have received the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick, others present often notice that the sick enter a period of growing peace and trust, together with a great surrender to the Will of God, and even serenity and desire for Heaven. This also applies to those who up to that point did not believe or even lived in mortal sin. Even these people, as the great theologians of the scholastics say–for example, St. Albert the Great or St. Bonaventure–go straight to Heaven without having to go through Purgatory first. This shows the wonderful grace coming from the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick.¹⁶

6. The last will be the first.

While many Christians do receive the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick, experience tells us that they do not go straight to Heaven. The mystics often relate that many priests and religious suffer a long time and have to wait for their release. However, all of them or almost all of them have received the Sacrament of the Anointing. What is the reason for this? The answer is certainly that they did not receive the Sacrament with the necessary repentance or surrender to the Will of God, or that they did not want to change their flaws and vices a long time before their death.

St. Therese of Lisieux tells us that she heard that sometimes great saints with many merits come before the Judgment of God, but have to go to Purgatory because our justice before God is often unclean. That is why she recommends to give
immediately away all the merits of our good deeds, and that it is better to appear before God empty-handed.¹⁷ She recommends to her oldest sister and godmother Marie, to be given Heaven free of charge by God.¹⁸

While on the one hand the first ones don’t always get to Heaven first, on the other hand there are enough examples that the last ones become the first ones. Therese refers in her writings to the Lord’s mercy towards the good thief,¹⁹ and wishes that the story from the “desert fathers,” about how a great sinner called Paesie died out of love and is being taken straight to heaven, should be added to her autobiography, “Souls will understand immediately, for it is a striking example of what I’m trying to say.”²⁰

When our great hour comes, as St. Therese writes to Abbe Roulland, missionary in China, if only we trust, the Blessed Virgin will obtain “the grace of making an act of perfect love” should we have “some trace of human weakness” and so will we reach heaven immediately after death.²¹

7. St. Therese’s teaching, a great message for the third millennium

One can rightfully say that Therese is turning all common opinions on Purgatory upside down.²² She wants to appear before God empty-handed and explains why it can be easier for sinners who have nothing to rely upon, to reach Heaven than the great saints with all their merits.. She emphasizes that trust alone is enough, that merits are no guarantee but often an obstacle for the straight way to Heaven, and that sins do not need to be an obstacle. After a ‘messed-up’ life, God can still take one straight to Heaven if the dying person only has trust. And how easy it can be to trust if there are no merits but only one’s misery! Through trust she shows the shorter way to Heaven to the small and humble. And so many can and will go that way. She writes about this to her sister Marie: “… what pleases Him (God) is that He sees me loving my littleness and my poverty, the blind hope that I have in His mercy… That is my only treasure, dear Godmother, why should this treasure not be yours?…”²³

As has been said, she has made sanctity available for everyone through her little way, and this is also true for the straight way to Heaven… This will no longer be an exception. Once those who are smart enough to gather from the treasures of our new Doctor of the Church will walk this way easily, especially those who want to be part of the legion of little souls which St. Therese asked God for at the end of her manuscript B, “I beg You to cast Your Divine Glance upon a great number of little souls. I beg You to choose a legion of little Victims worthy of Your LOVE!”²⁴ Yes, by listening to her wonderful message there will be many, many souls… and with that, Purgatory stops being the unavoidable detour to Heaven!

Conclusion

St. Therese of the Child Jesus gave us a lot to think about. There are yet many new thoughts to be understood in terms of theology. For us, however, the most important, even existentially significant of everything she wrote is the message on Purgatory. The question of what happens to us after death should move us deeply. Let us just remember Sr. Febronia and her suffering in Purgatory; her silent message from the next world should move us. “It seemed,” says Therese, “as if she wanted to say: If I had listened to you I would not be here now.” This is actually shocking when you think about it. One has to admit that Sr. Febronia entered the next world through the wrong door. And with her, thousands and millions who would have managed to avoid Purgatory. And why did they not achieve this? The simple reason is that nobody showed them the correct way. Considering this, one does understand that Therese is a true gift to the Church. God gave her to us as leader and comforter for the apocalyptic days in which we very obviously live. Her message concerning Purgatory is a true grace of God’ s merciful love for the moment of our death. One can apply the urgent exhortation of our LORD: “‘He who has ears to hear. let him hear” (Lk. 8:8).

Father Dr. Hubert van Dijk, ORC

Footnotes:

1. I would like to enlighten souls-as did the Prophets and the Doctors.’ St. Therese of Lisieux. Story of a Soul. ICS. Washington
DC, 1996, Ms B, 2v, pg. 192.
2. St. Therese of Lisieux . Story of a SOUL, ICS, Washington DC, 1996, Ms A, 49r. Jig. 105.
3. Divini Amoris, I.c., Nr. 7.
4. Philippe de la Trinite, La Doctrine de Sainte Therese sur Ie Purgatoire. Editions du Parvis, CH-1648 Hauteville/Suisse 1992,
pg. 16. .
5. Annales de Sainte Therese, Lisieux. Nr. 610, Febr. 1982. Translated from the German.
6. Last Conversations, ICS. Washington DC. 1971, pg 273..
7. La Doctrine, l.c. pg 16. Translated from the German.
8. St. John of the Cross, The Dark Night, IT. ch. XX.
9. Ferdinand Holbőck. Das Fegefeuer, Salzburg 1977, page 94f. Translated from the German.
10. La Doctrine, I.c.page 22f. Translated from the German.
11. Lucien Regnault, La Pensee de Ste. Therese de 1′Enfant Jesus sur Ie Purgatoire in Annales de Sainte Therese, 1986, Suppl. Nr
101, pages 21-29, quote on page 26. Translated from the German.
12. Annales de Sainte Therese, Nr. 610. Feb. 1983, page 5. Translated from the German.
13. Story of a Soul, Ms A, 84v, pg.181.
14. La Pensee, l.c., page 23. Translated from the German.
15. St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Suppl. Qu. 30, art. 1. Translated from the German.
16. P. Philipon. Vie Spirituelle, Jan./Feb. 1945, pages 21-23; 16-17. Translated from the German.
17. La Doctrine, l.c. page 13. Translated from the German.
18. St. Therese of Lisieux, Letters St. Therese of Lisieux, ICS, Washington DC, 1913, Vol. II, pg 998, LT 197.
19. Pious Recreations, RP 6, 9v, translated from the German.
20. Last Conversations. pg. 89. CJ, 11.7.6
21. Letters of St. Therese of Lisieux . Vol. II, pg. 1093, LT 226.
22. La Pensee, l.c., pg. 28. Translated from the German.
23. Letters of St. Therese of Lisieux, Vol. II, pg. 999, LT 197.
24. Story of a Soul, pg. 200. Ms B, 5v.

(1) Webmaster’s Note: This article, in German, appears in the December 2001, and the January 2002 issue of “Der Fels” (A German Catholic Publication) – see www.der-fels.de/2001/12-2001.pdf and www.der-fels.de/2002/01-2002.pdf respectively. It was translated into English by Père (Father) de la Trinité, ocd. Fr. Van Dijk, confirmed the authenticity of his writing – which I had requested because it appears that our website is the only place where this article appears in English. We have checked the references noted in the Footnotes, they all check out. Fr. Van Dijk hopes that we can make his paper known to the world. We shall try to do that. / Fred Schaeffer, SFO, webmaster.

Fruit of the Spirit: Patience

“Patience is the virtue which makes us accept for love of God, generously and peacefully, everything that is displeasing to our nature, without allowing ourselves to be depressed by the sadness which easily comes over us when we meet with disagreeable things,” writes Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D in Divine Intimacy.

Because all things work for the good of those who love God (Romans 8:28), every suffering that we encounter, whether it is a major trial or a minor annoyance, is the best thing for us at the moment to help us along the way to Heaven. When we suffer, we are being perfected. The Lord once said to St. Teresa of Avila, “Know that the souls dearest to My Father are those who are afflicted with the greatest sufferings.” I suspect there is a direct correlation between the degree to which we endure disagreeable things, and the degree to which we grow as a result of that suffering.

When we find we are lacking patience in an area, whether it is enduring difficult people or situations, then we can learn from this experience and choose to mortify our tendency to become angry, resentful, frustrated, or depressed – some of the “anti-fruits” of patience – when we encounter these daily crosses in the future. At first we may experience these feelings, but choose not to make an exterior display of them, making others aware of our impatience and displeasure.  Over time, this exterior action, combined with prayer and the Sacraments, will have an effect on our hearts. With God’s grace, the interior transformation will begin.

St. Therese of Lisieux is one model of patience and charity:

“Therese deliberately sought the company of the sisters who, on account of their imperfections, were shunned by others, or those who pleased her least. One of these was very difficult to live with on account of her crotchety character and disagreeable manner. Therese forced herself to treat her “as she would the person that she loved most.” At times when she was tempted to give a sharp answer, she treated the Sister’s rudeness with a friendly smile. This puzzled the nun so much that she asked the Saint one day why she was so attracted to her. Therese replied that she smiled each time they met because she was “glad to see her.” In recounting this incident later, she added with a twinkle in her eye: “Of course I didn’t tell her that I was acting from a supernatural motive.” We learn from the Saint herself that her charity towards that Sister gained for her so great a grace that, from that time, she had no further difficulty in practicing that virtue.

When others complained to her about the unpleasant character of that nun and the annoyance they suffered on her account, she replied: “Be very kind to that Sister. It is both an act of charity and an exercise of patience. We must not allow our own souls to be upset and yield to interior bitterness. We must sweeten our minds by charitable thoughts. After that, the practice of patience will become almost natural.” (Rev. Francois Jamart, O.C.D., Complete Spiritual Doctrine of St. Therese of Lisieux, pp. 96-97)

The greatest model of patience is Jesus who suffered in His Passion, not only without complaint, but also with love for the very ones who were crucifying Him. Saint Faustina writes, “During Holy Mass, I saw Jesus stretched out on the Cross, and He said to me, ‘My pupil, have great love for those who cause you suffering. Do good to those who hate you.’

I answered, ‘O my Master, You see very well that I feel no love for them, and that troubles me.’

Jesus answered, ‘It is not always within your power to control your feelings. You will recognize that you have love if, after having experienced annoyance and contradiction, you do not lose your peace, but pray for those who have made you suffer and wish them well.’” (Divine Mercy in My Soul, paragraph 1628)  One way to pray for difficult people, especially those we might consider enemies, is to pray, “Lord, grant them happiness in this life and in the next.”

Fr. Gabriel explains how we can develop patience:  “In order to begin to practice patience, we must try to bear daily annoyances and sufferings resignedly, without complaint knowing that divine Providence does not permit any trial that will not be a source of good for us.  In the beginning, and even for a long time, we may experience a great repugnance for suffering.  Nevertheless, if we try to accept it as we should, with constancy, peace, and submission to the divine will, we shall gradually be cognizant of the great spiritual profit that flows from it; we shall feel more detached from creatures and from ourselves, and closer to God.  Then shall we come to value suffering spontaneously; and later, having experienced its spiritual fruitfulness more completely we shall finally come to love it.

But let us have no illusions: the love of suffering is the summit of patience; it is the fruit of patience brought to perfection. To reach this height, we must begin with a much humbler practice; that is , the peaceful and uncomplaining acceptance of everything that makes us suffer.” (Divine Intimacy, p. 378)

Fruits of the Holy Spirit

A while back, my pastor, Father Jack, mentioned in a homily that a good examination of conscience is to  meditate on the twelve Fruits of the Holy Spirit (charity, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, generosity, gentleness, faithfulness, modesty, self-control, and chastity) and consider in what areas of our lives we bear the opposite of that fruit.  If we are living the Christ life,  then we should be bearing fruit that becomes gradually more abundant.   In our first steps in the spiritual life, these fruits will be small, but as we continue our journey, they should grow and mature.   But sometimes our growth is slowed by some attachment to sin – an “anti-fruit” if you will, and we may not even realize it.

Meditating on the Fruits of the Spirit can help us grow in self-knowledge so that we can identify areas of our life that we need to work on, to bring to God in prayer, and bring to Confession for healing.  In the following series of 12 blog entries,  I will write about each fruit and its corresponding “anti-fruit”, in hopes that it will be food for thought in your own meditations.

The Beautiful Hands of a Priest

We need them in life’s early morning,
We need them again at its close;
We feel their warm clasp of true friendship,
We seek it while tasting life’s woes.

When we come to this world we are sinful,
The greatest as well as the least.
And the hands that make us pure as angels
Are the beautiful hands of a priest.

At the altar each day we behold them,
And the hands of a king on his throne
Are not equal to them in their greatness
Their dignity stands alone.

For there in the stillness of morning
Ere the sun has emerged from the east,
There God rests between the pure fingers
Of the beautiful hands of a priest.

When we are tempted and wander
To pathways of shame and sin
‘Tis the hand of a priest that absolve us.
Not once but again and again.

And when we are taking life’s partner
Other hands may prepare us a feast
But the hands that will bless and unite us,
Are the beautiful hands of a priest.

God bless them and keep them all holy,
For the Host which their fingers caress,
What can a poor sinner do better
Than to ask Him who chose them to bless

When the death dews on our lids are falling,
May our courage and strength be increased
By seeing raised o’er us in blessing
The beautiful hands of a priest.

-Author Unknown

Come, Holy Spirit

Holy Spirit, Lord of Light,
From the clear celestial height.
Thy pure beaming radiance give.

Come, thou Father of the poor,
Come, with treasures which endure;
Come, thou Light of all that live!

Thou, of all consolers best,
Thou, the soul’s delightful guest,
Dost refreshing peace bestow.

Thou in toil art comfort sweet;
Pleasant coolness in the heat;
Solace in the midst of woe.

Light immortal, Light divine,
Visit thou these hearts of thine,
And our inmost being fill.

If thou take thy grace away,
Nothing pure in man will stay;
All his good is turned to ill.

Heal our wounds, our strength renew;
On our dryness pour thy dew,
Wash the stains of guilt away.

Bend the stubborn heart and will;
Melt the frozen, warm the chill;
Guide the steps that go astray.

Thou, on us who evermore
Thee confess and thee adore,
With thy sevenfold gifts descend.

Give us comfort when we die;
Give us life with thee on high;
Give us joys that never end.
Amen.  Alleluia.

- Sequence for the Solemnity of Pentecost,  Ascribed to Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury (+1228)

The Interior Life

The Lord said to her in reply, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things.  There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.”  (Luke 10:41-42)

From The Three Ages of the Interior Life  by Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P.

The One Thing Necessary

As everyone can easily understand, the interior life is an elevated form of intimate conversation which everyone has with himself as soon as he is alone, even in the tumult of a great city. From the moment he ceases to converse with his fellow men, man converses interiorly with himself about what preoccupies him most. This conversation varies greatly according to the different ages of life; that of an old man is not that of a youth. It also varies greatly according as a man is good or bad.

As soon as a man seriously seeks truth and goodness, this intimate conversation with himself tends to become conversation with God. Little by little, instead of seeking himself in everything, instead of tending more or less consciously to make himself a center, man tends to seek God in everything, and to substitute for egoism love of God and of souls in Him. This constitutes the interior life. No sincere man will have any difficulty in recognizing it. The one thing necessary which Jesus spoke of to Martha and Mary consists in hearing the word of God and living by it.

The interior life thus conceived is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science as if God did not exist. In their mo­ments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be in certain respects the search for the true and the good in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.

This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation.

There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death or after purification in purgatory. No one enters heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin though it should be venial, must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into purgatory to be purified.

The interior life of a just man who tends toward God and who already lives by Him is indeed the one thing necessary. To be a saint, neither intellectual culture nor great exterior activity is a requisite; it suffices that we live profoundly by God. This truth is evident in the saints of the early Church; several of those saints were poor people, even slaves. It is evident also in St. Francis, St. Benedict Joseph Labre, in the Cure of Ars, and many others. They all had a deep understanding of these words of our Savior: “For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?”  If people sacrifice so many things to save the life of the body, which must ultimately die, what should we not sacrifice to save the life of our soul, which is to last forever? Ought not man to love his soul more than his body? “Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” our Lord adds.  “One thing is necessary,” He tells us. To save our soul, one thing alone is necessary: to hear the word of God and to live by it. Therein lies the best part, which will not be taken away from a faithful soul even though it should lose everything else.

New Life in Christ

A must-read by Archbishop Charles J. Chaput:

New Life in Christ: What it Looks Like, What it Demands

The Thirst of Jesus

Another wonderful meditation by the Missionaries of Charity Fathers.   This one is    “on the love that expresses   the face of Jesus as imprinted in the Shroud of Turin,” written by Fr. Joseph Langford, MC.

The Thirst of Jesus

Blessed are they who hope in the Lord

Today’s Mass readings (Jeremiah 17:5-10) speak of our need to trust in God, especially in troubled times such as these.

Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose hope is the LORD.

If we place our hope in anything other than God, we are bound to be disappointed.   When we understand that Christ is our hope, then temporal hardships will not crush us.   I think that now more than ever, we need to gain perspective.  Those who have placed their hope in money are finding when they lose their jobs, they’ve lost their hope.  More and more we hear in the news of people committing suicide, even killing their families too – over a lost job or a foreclosed home.  What a nightmare it must be to have so little faith that the loss of a job or a home also means the loss of a reason to live.  If we are so wrapped up in passing things that we pay little attention to the thought of where we will spend eternity, then our priorities are woefully out of order.   Daily prayer is necessary to gain the perspective we will need to weather the coming storms of financial and civil instability, and the storms of persecution. 

He is like a tree planted beside the waters that stretches out its roots to the stream: It fears not the heat when it comes, its leaves stay green; In the year of drought it shows no distress, but still bears fruit.

What a rich passage.  Rooted in prayer and the Sacraments, we will not wither in the heat and the drought.   God will sustain us in our trials.  With God, we will even bear fruit in the hard times.   

Remember that you were born to be a light in the world during this dark time.  Right now we need to remain close to God and trust Him, not losing our hope no matter what happens.  We should give nothing in this world the power to take our joy, peace, hope, and love.  We are here for a short time and any suffering we endure is both temporary and purifying.   We need to remind ourselves often that God is in charge, and that “all things work for the good of those who love God, who are called according to His purpose.”  (Romans 8:28)

Let us be prayerful people so that we will bear fruit for God’s Kingdom even in the drought.

Lessons from Lepers

We can learn much about our own spiritual journeys by observing the interactions Jesus had with people who encountered him.  Two examples that have really spoken to me lately are recent Mass readings involving the healing of lepers.

One is from Mark 1:40-42:

A leper came to him and kneeling down begged him and said, “If you wish, you can make me clean.”  Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand, touched the leper, and said to him, “I do will it. Be made clean.”  The leprosy left him immediately, and he was made clean.

Jesus wishes to free us from sin, the way He freed the leper from his disease.   But Jesus doesn’t just stop at healing the cause of our disfiguration; He wants to sanctify us:  The leprosy left him immediately, and he was made clean. 

We cannot free ourselves from sin any more than the leper could free himself from his disease simply by willing it.  Like the leper, we need to pray to Jesus, “If you wish, you can make me clean.”  We need to bring our wounds and weakness to Him, and ask for His healing.  

That healing can be found through the Sacraments.  Reconciliation removes the disease and restores us to sanctifying grace, and the Eucharist makes us clean by strengthening that grace and making us more like Christ every time we receive.   It is important to receive the Eucharist with faith and devotion; if we walk up to Communion and receive without giving it much thought, we don’t benefit as much as we could.  (See further reading below on Embracing Both Sacrament and Sacramental Effect). 

A second inspiring reading is the healing of the ten lepers from Luke 17:11-19:

On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee. As he entered a village, ten lepers approached him. Keeping their distance, they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” When he saw them he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were made clean. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan. Then Jesus asked, “Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” Then he said to him, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”

It is easy to focus on what we lack and forget to thank God for the work He has done in us.  We need to consider the progress we have made and praise God for accomplishing it, otherwise we are behaving like the nine lepers who never returned. 

I’ve found that after Communion is one of the best times for prayers of thanksgiving for the ways in which we have been made clean.  Recently I read a private revelation by Catalina Rivas on The Holy Mass.    This material carries an imprimatur, and I think it is good food for thought.  I’ve linked it below for those who are interested. 

Catalina writes that during Mass, she was able to overhear another’s prayer after Communion, which was a prayer of requests and complaints.  She then writes,

Jesus said in a sad tone: “Did you notice? Not once did she tell Me
that she loved Me. Not once did she give thanks for My gift to her of bringing My Divinity down to her poor humanity to elevate her toward Me.  Not a single time did she say: ‘Thank You Lord.’ It has been a litany of requests… and almost all of those who come to receive Me are like that.

Let us be both like the leper who understood that God can make him clean, and like the one leper who returned to praise God for the healing he received. 

Further reading:  The Holy Mass by Catalina Rivas Imprimatur: Bishop Jose Oscar Brahona C.

Embracing Both Sacrament and Sacramental Effect Catherine of Siena Institute Blog