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Even sick, disabled and paralyzed people, like every conscious person above the age of reason, can exercise his or her free will, in order to choose to live with a loving and grateful heart and outlook, or to live in self-pity and even despair. Plainly, God lovingly makes allowances for the troubles people suffer, but each person can develop a soul radiant with Divine Light, or, refusing grace, have a soul which is shrivelled and lifeless.

Each human being is a body-with-a-soul. It's as if, by having free-will, we can choose to open the door of our heart or soul to let in God's light, or we can keep the door shut, ignore our consciences, and live in spiritual darkness.

Some people are so determined to enjoy independence from God - not realising the danger - that by deliberate sin it's as if they nail shut the 'door' of their souls, and so prevent the light or wisdom of God from entering. This self-imposed darkness will be theirs forever, unless they repent before they die.

There are times in a person's life when he might not want to be separated from God, and so have opened the door of his soul by good thoughts, or prayer, but looking upwards, realises he has not yet gained the courage to make real changes in his behaviour. He can be powerfully helped by the prayers of people aware of his plight - by the grace of Christ.

When we have shown our love for Christ by fulfilling our ordinary duties but want to offer Him further good deeds, we need not worry about doing one very good thing or another, as if He might be displeased by the deed. It's as if Christ is speaking to His friends in Heaven, at a banquet, saying, 'This friend on earth make me very happy. Every good deed she offers me, whatever it is, is like a bowl of delicious food'.

A Catholic in a state of grace who wants to be helped to understand her union with the Blessed Trinity is not wrong to use imagery, of various kinds; yet rather than picturing herself as being in front of Three Divine Persons Who are, somehow, one God, she will be helped by seeing herself as if within a transparent globe, which is Their life of light and love.

The Church has approved the use of imagery, to help us grow in understanding of the Catholic Faith - and to help us in our prayer. Yet if we wish to know God, we must move in prayer beyond the image, aiming our hearts and wills, in fervent desire, towards the transcendent, invisible Father Who has revealed Himself in His Son.

Christ is the way, the truth and the life: the only Saviour. Christ asks every Christian teacher, author, parent, religious, Clergyman and missionary to do what St. Paul did, who urged people to be reconciled with God, through Christ, in Baptism or Confession. It is as if Christ says, in this age of hesitation or even doubt: 'Would you send people to a false god or to false prophets?' He is the Way.

People who take other people hostage and keep them captive do the opposite of what Jesus did - Who came to set people free from sin and slavery. There is a need for prisons, in ordinary life, for people justly tried and found guilty. But those who keep innocent people captive do, in physical terms, what the evil one does in spiritual ways. Indeed, they have aligned themselves with the evil one who always opposes God and goodness.

Christ wants everyone to know and serve Him, in His Church. Everyone who claims to know Christ's Will, and professes a desire to lead people to Christ, must examine his conscience. He must answer to God for what he sees in his own heart. Each of us knows if we are really urging people to turn to Christ, or are encouraging indifferentism, saying it doesn't really matter about commitment or Baptism.

The Lord sees how tirelessly people search the streets for a suitable place in which to live; yet He wishes we would all expend as much time and energy on searching for the meaning of life - which He has revealed to us as being union with God in this life and in Eternity, through having our sins forgiven, through faith in Jesus Christ.

We should not expect people to reward us for our charity. God will. Christ asks us to show love to everyone, like Him: unconditional love. This does not mean that we cannot make prudent divisions about who has first place in our lives, who is trustworthy, who needs correction or even reproof; but we must be kind, and look for the best in them; however, we cannot expect that our love will always be reciprocated. Some people will ignore or reject us, no matter how kind we try to be.

God created a beautiful world, and beautiful lands. But greed, false beliefs, and a lust for power are commonplace. All over the world, sinful people - including sinful Government leaders - make other people's lives a misery. Yet only in exceptional circumstances should one nation invade another to put right dreadful wrongs.

Prayer for evil rulers is more important than political activism. The mind and will of a person enslaved by evil is like a temple of doom, where Satan is at work. Principles and persons are sacrificed on the altar of personal ambition, lust or greed; and that person is incapable of doing good because of his enslavement, unless he repents. By the grace of God, he could change.

Our faith will increase, if we accept the truth taught by the Church: that the One Who suffered on the Cross on Calvary, shed His Blood for sinners, and died, is the very Son of God Who comes amongst us at every Mass, made Present at the Consecration, to pray with us, and for us, in the presence of His adoring Angels.

God the Father sent His Son to earth not just to die for our sins, but also to found a Church. If we follow her teachings about good and evil, by the grace of Christ, we bring about the fulfilment of God's plan for human life. People who claim to be practicing Catholics but who dispute long-standing teaching and discipline are like jigsaw pieces who agreed to be parts of a beautiful landscape but who now do what they please, and refuse to complete the Designer's plan.

God wants each of us to realise that the Blessed Virgin Mary is not just an historical figure, or a person pictured in our Christmas cards, but is a living woman: a great Saint: the Mother of Jesus Christ. She reigns in Heaven with Him, and reaches out to help us by her powerful and loving intercessions.

It's as if God is like Three loving parents. Some people mock the simple requests of the faithful, and say that God is not a 'Sugar Daddy' or a Fairy Godmother. Christ wants us to know, however, that what He said in the Gospel is true. The nature of God is generosity and love. So when we ask God - Father, Son and Holy Spirit - for something in prayer, believing that it will be ours, we shall receive it, if of course we have prayed properly, with trust and reverence, in the name of Jesus.

For progress in prayer, and union with God, we ought to trust God, and be willing to be converted, again. People who don't want God don't pray much, or well, even if they believe in God. They don't want God's light to shine into their souls, encouraging them to give up their bad habits, unloving attitudes, selfish plans or uncharitable schemes. It's as though they keep the 'door' of their souls almost shut; alas, they themselves shut out God's graces in this way.

If we look beyond our Christmas decorations towards the Heavens, it can remind us of the gap between human beings and the Godhead: a gap we could not bridge through our own strength, which is why Christ came down to earth, and was born of Mary: to rescue us from weakness and sin. He founded a Church, so that by His power, given in the sacraments, we can be made holy, worthy of union with the Blessed Trinity and of Heaven.