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Christ told me: "By reverence, you enter into the Mystery. By the opposite, you cast yourself out". He was speaking about the Mystery of friendship with and intimacy with God. Great faith in Him should show itself in gestures of reverence and gratitude.
Christ asks us to conduct a fundamental reappraisal of our current attitudes and actions to do with reverence towards Him. It is time that we acted as if we recognise Christ as our Lord and God, each time we enter a church or receive Him in Holy Communion or welcome Him into our homes in the Sacrament of the Sick.
When Christ 'visits the sick' through the Blessed Sacrament being brought by a priest or extraordinary minister of communion to a sick person, He is delighted to know that, out of love for Him, some Catholics make reverent practical and spiritual preparations.
Only in Heaven, Christ explained, is everybody perfect, so though we should all aim for perfection, none should grow despondent about our tiny faults, nor imagine that Christ is displeased with our efforts. (It is always possible, with God's help, to avoid mortal sin, if we wish).
After Confession: The Most Holy Trinity showed me, by an image, that each of the Three Divine Persons - one God - forgave me for every sin and failing and invited me to be joyful.
Christ our God is Really Present with us, in His glory, at the Consecration, aflame with holiness. He asks: can we not adore Him, as the Angels do, instead of showing irreverence by our chatter and our careless gestures and lukewarm prayers?
Christ sees, as if it is laid out like a picture before Him, the whole of humanity, from the first man, to the moment of fulfilment at the Parousia, when Christ will come in glory. He sees, all at once, the entire life of every person who has ever lived or will ever live.
Christ already 'sees' the beginning and end of every life - long or short - for all time. We have no right to end our lives by our own action.
Christ our God can see the whole earth, all at once, and everyone on it. And He can see our countries, towns, homes and hearts. He is at work to guide us to make wise decisions. He longs to see us happy and holy both now and forever. Nothing is hidden from Him.
Christ gives every sinner opportunities for reflection, repentance and change. Yet people who continue to ignore His invitation are heading for spiritual disaster as surely as people travelling on a fast steam-train as it suddenly approaches a fallen tree on the track.
Christ is concerned for everyone and everything on our planet as He intercedes for us and offers His Holy Sacrifice.
Christ showed me in Holy Communion that the Father in Heaven gazes with delight upon all who work to see the sacraments - including the Mass - celebrated with due reverence and gratitude, and to ensure that the Faith is taught in its fullness and not watered down to 'fit in' with what others think.
If I remember that Christ is always present, wherever I speak with a friend, I will be more likely to 'weigh' every word. Where three are present in this way, charity can reign.
The souls of those who live in serious sin, without following God's laws and the Church's teachings, are like a sea of melting ice, in which there is no hope of life; the souls of those in a 'state of grace', however, are like a land of fruit trees, cornfields, rivers and blue skies, far above the icy wastes, close to a mountain whose top lies in heaven.
Wherever Catholics try to teach, organise, plan, run programmes, or live without reverence for Christ or love for Him Really Present in the Holy Eucharist, their lives become a spiritual wasteland, like a sheet of melting ice where few creatures can live, and there is no firm foothold.
From the fatherly love of God - like a pinpoint far in the distance, before time - has come everything good: Creation, life, God's plan of salvation, the Son Who died for us, the Spirit Who guides us, the Church which sanctifies us.
In wartime, some people slipped away from a town in darkness, to join the partisans in the hills, and to work for justice and the defeat of evil conquerors. And in the Church today, faithful members work quietly to defeat the evils that have entered the Church: irreverence, dissent and heresy.
God, the King of Kings, lives in Heaven, yet has an 'outpost' in a foreign country, Earth, where His ambassadors keep a special residence, with a throne-room, which He can visit. Hence the reverent silence appropriate for that place: a Catholic church.
If the Queen were to walk down the centre aisle in our church, would the chatter cease? Would people bow or stand or curtsey, and keep silent, in case she wished to speak? Can we not do the same, now, for the King of Kings, Who is Present in the tabernacle?
It is as though, to reach Heaven, we must deliberately aim for Heaven, swimming against the powerful current that might draw us into a 'whirlpool' of evil that leads to Hell. Baptism is like a set of water wings that hold us up and give us confidence about life in Christ, and the power to become holy and to persevere.
Showing 621 - 640 of 1911