Search Page

The journey to Heaven is, for most people, a slow and arduous climb. Christ wants each of us to believe in His love, to persevere in faith, hope, love and humility, and to avoid pride and vainglory. People who want to be Saints think more about God's goodness that about their own gifts, talents, plans and ambitions.

Christ asks us to avoid all pride and vainglory. He wants everyone to know how much He loves each one of us; but He does not want priests or teachers to encourage children to start the day by saying: "I am great, I am wonderful, I am proud of being me!" He asks us to aim for humility, rather than concentrating on self-esteem.

A home where God's Will is believed and acted upon is like a lit cottage in a frozen landscape - so pleasing to God, but rare, in that there are few households even amongst Catholics where is found neither contraception nor abortion or pornography or adultery and where charitable speech and behaviour is the norm, by the grace of Christ. These bright households also care for their sick members if they can, including the elderly.

It is only too easy to avoid doing God's Will. There are some Christians who neglect the Fourth Commandment about honouring father and mother. It's as if a woman complains that if granny comes to live with them, they won't be able to continue with their dinner parties - and the children will grumble about having to behave at meals.

The soul of a person who lives to please and obey Christ is like a fertile valley. Although enemies might rain down missiles from above, behind the mountain tops, they cannot conquer, if that devoted soul relies on God's grace, given in prayer and the sacraments. This keeps the valley peaceful and beautiful, whether the enemies are the worldly-wise, or the demons who bring torments and temptations.

Some people refuse to be helped towards salvation and joy. When we pray in the name of Jesus we should be confident that the Father will hear our prayers and grant many of our wishes: if they are in accordance with His Will; but it can happen that certain persons refuse to benefit from our intercessions. If they are people who insist on walking away from God, refusing to co-operate with His graces, we cannot raise them up to Heaven by our prayer. God has given them free will; and some condemn themselves.

Christ's friends live as if within a bight cloud, of God's love. When we live in union with God in everyday life, nourished by the Sacraments, forgiven and in a state of grace, we do not need to see the path ahead, before we can love and serve God well. We don't need to picture the future. Even if we are uncertain of His plans for us, or unsure of our vocation, we should be confident that here, from moment to moment, we can delight Him by doing His Will, in our ordinary circumstances.

It can be helpful to turn from habitual prayers to a Litany, or to Sacred Scripture. If our routine prayers are disturbed by assaults from the evil one, or unwanted images, temptations or suggestions, we can change our plans - not by, abandoning prayer, but by praying in another way, so that his plans are confounded; and we shall still give glory to God, and benefit our own souls and those of other people, as we remain in the 'bright cloud' which is God, our hearts full of love for Him.

We must be kind to everyone, especially when a person is agonising over a major problem, knowing what to do, to please God, to act justly, and to correct his appalling behaviour. He is like a fish on a hook, wriggling, in torment. He dreads the humiliation involved, though he now wants to do right.

It can be distressining, to see people we know apparently taking the wrong road, away from Christ, and Heaven. Only God knows their final destination; and we are right to hope, and to intercede for them; however, some people use their gift of free-will deliberately to disobey Christ, act unjustly, or ignore the teachings of the Church about charity, and penance; and, like Christ, we must accept that they have made their own choices, even foolish ones.

A person who feels trapped in bad habits and misery is like a man in a dark hut in the middle of a snow-field; but if he uses a generator to blast hot air at the snow he can make a pathway to a warm area - just as people who use the sacraments, and prayer, can make dramatic changes, by God's grace, to their sad, guilty lives.

Especially if we are doing important work for Christ, the evil one is capable of hurling painful memories to our imagination, trying to stir up our minds in fruitless speculation, so that we will lose trust in Christ and become miserable or afraid - or full of self-pity, or anxiety. We must not give in, but should focus our minds, by God's grace, on all the good things for which we can be thankful to God.

As we pray in the name of Christ to God our Father, the most important thing about prayer is that we approach God with hearts open to His love, willing to learn from Him, and reverent, humble, contrite and grateful. Books can be useful, if they give us words in which to clothe our thoughts, for a sincere offering to God; but books are useless, if we read to God but do so without humility, without trust, or without willingness to love, forgive and serve our neighbour.

Although God allowed sinful men, whom He justified, to guide and lead His People, He wants to teach all the peoples of the world through the truth spoken by His own Son, on earth, hence the Incarnation and Birth of Jesus Christ. He was inevitably persecuted and killed, yet knowing and accepting this in advance. But death, a punishment for sin, could not hold the sinless one, or His sinless Virgin Mother. They are in Heaven now, encouraging us to persevere is truth and holiness.

Just as people who deliberately choose to ignore all warnings, and walk around the rim of the crater of a volcano, are in danger of falling into the fire, through their own foolishness and pride, so, those people who deliberately defy God by acting against His moral law are in danger of falling into Hell, through their own fault, unless they repent before they die.

We cannot look away when people starve; nor should we look away when the souls of fellow creatures are in danger. People who deliberately defy God's law, and commit mortal sin, and who even show pride in what they do, or boast about it, are as if climbers dancing only inches away from the mouth of a live volcano. They will end in Hell, unless they repent; and so they are in desperate need of our fervent intercessions.

Those who are constantly within the Church but fighting in the Church, protesting against her doctrines and disciplines, will not make much spiritual progress. Discontented, acting against Christ Who has given us the Pope to guide us, and the other Catholic Bishops, the dissenters should do what Saint Peter did before Christ. He surrendered to Christ and to His Will, just as the Saints have, through the ages, in love and obedience. Surrender is the 'key' to joy in Christ.

The key to happiness within the Catholic Church, and joy in Eternity, consists of obedience to the Commandments and to legitimate discipline, and humble agreement with every matter of faith and morals - rather than doing what so many Catholics do, as they spend their lives complaining and arguing, and do not allow God to make them joyful.

If a child could look back five centuries, then another five, then another - to when Christ lived on earth, she would see: the very same Catholic Faith is taught today, as in the first century after Christ. God the Father looks upon the earth, glad to see people who believe in the whole Deposit of Faith, handed down from the time of Jesus Christ and the Apostles. Yet very few believe the Faith in its entirety; so, in our age, as in the first century, and the fifth, tenth and fifteenth, there is a great need for witness, evangelisation, and intercession.

As we pray for the Holy Souls we help them to move forward, closer to Heaven's light. It is as if they are in a queue, waiting their turn to meet Christ and His Mother Mary. We cannot see the Holy Souls, but if we could peep into Purgatory as if into a cellar beneath our world, we would see that they are safe, content to be in God's care, grateful for the prospect of Heaven.