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In the life of the Spirit, interiorly, God can bring about astonishing changes in the lives of ourselves, or of people we know, as great as if some slum-dwellers were to become famous in Hollywood. But just as those people would never have become actors if they had refused to speak to the film director, we and our friends cannot hope to enjoy great spiritual progress if we refuse to speak to God, or to follow His directions.

Even if we were to avoid sports or obvious dangers there is no time in life, no matter how happy, when an accident can't happen - just as a skier might suddenly fall, or hit a hidden tree-stump. What counts in ordinary life is faith in God. If we trust in God, He gives us strength and patience in our troubles, and also allows them to purify us so that we are worthy of Heaven: His free gift to His friends.

Just as a skier cannot avoid occasional falls, we cannot live on earth without troubles of one sort or another; but we can act, by God's grace, to avoid the greatest of all disasters, which would be to end up in the pit of Hell, by our own fault, and not reach Heaven. It is by faith in God, and doing His Will, in response to His call, that we can allow Him to make us holy. Then, by prayer and acts of charity, we prepare for life in Heaven, no matter what temporary problems we endure in this world.

Satan's great desire is to wreck God's plan for family life. Satan reaches out of the depths of Hell - out of the Abyss - to encourage family breakdown, to help spouses to desert one another, to cause children to be rebellious, and women to have abortions, and young adults to neglect their aging parents. He is also undermining the principles of people in Government, to induce them to pass anti-family laws.

God created, in the beginning, a beautiful world, as a beautiful setting for the people He would make. He wanted the families of the earth to flourish, to reproduce, and to find joy in earthly life, in His presence; but human beings rebelled; and Satan is still at work, today, working to draw people away from God.

As surely as terrorists destroy buildings and human lives, Satan destroys families by his malice and his evil influence. Satan acts against the love and joy in family life, working to remove harmony, peace, kindness, faithfulness, forgiveness, sobriety and prayer. Those who attack the family are doing Satan's work; yet God is stronger than an angel, no matter how wicked the angel; and we must count on God's help.

As surely as terrorists destroy buildings and human lives, Satan destroys families by his malice and his evil influence. Satan acts against the love and joy in family life, working to remove harmony, peace, kindness, faithfulness, forgiveness, sobriety and prayer. Those who attack the family are doing Satan's work; yet God is stronger than an angel, no matter how wicked the angel; and we must count on God's help.

A woman's body, instincts, heart and mind are designed to enable her to cherish life within herself, should she conceive. A woman who seeks an abortion is seeking an evil act that will harm her as well as her baby. To have an abortion is to act against her own body, even if she persuades herself otherwise. Her heartache will begin.

There is only one fate for those who have freely chosen to ignore God or to disobey His laws, and to persevere in self-love and sin until death: it is to be exiled from God, through their own fault, as if falling through a gap in the wall that separates earthly life from Eternity, and falling into the River of the dead which surges onwards to Hell.

Everyone who hopes for union with God in Heaven should ask himself, is he the sort of person who will be happy there: pure-in-heart, peaceful, holy? People who are more anxious about fulfilling their earthly desires and ambitions - including sexual desires - than about honouring God by obeying His laws are not making the necessary preparation for the reception of the gift of salvation.

A call to the Sacred Priesthood is a call to a man, from the Most Blessed Trinity, to accept a way of life in a most exalted state, which no-one can deserve. This call is made in the presence of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the Archangels; and loving service as another Christ, in this world, however arduous, will be followed by a glorious welcome in the next.

We are not all chosen to be official 'Evangelisers'; yet those who experience the peace-of-soul, spiritual growth and intellectual delight of the true Faith, and who are grateful for life in Christ, are not acting kindly if they don't share the Faith at suitable opportunities, or if they even advise other people to keep on with their mistaken beliefs or superstitious practices. It's as if people on their way to a warm climate can choose whether to take pity on a family they see, huddled in a snowfield, or can ignore them whilst rejoicing in their own good fortune.

A man who expects to hear the truth about sin and salvation, Church and evangelisation, holiness and Heaven, will often be disappointed at ecumenical gatherings where people are afraid of appearing divisive. They stick to safe subjects such as consumerism, pollution, nuclear war, and global warming, while people long to be helped to understand the meaning of 'Church', or helped in their personal spiritual journeys.

Christ asks His friends to be brave in speaking the truth about God and goodness; but He also asks us to be prudent. We need not feel guilty about avoiding trouble and controversy when this is possible without cowardice. He Himself ran away or hid, to avoid death, when He had stirred up anger by His words, but when it was too early to fulfil His great plan.

We might change, if we pictured the different people Jesus meets in prayer: some scowling at Him, some glad to be near, some not sure it's worthwhile, some not convinced that He hears, some not willing to give up their sins, some thrilled to be able to speak with Him at any time of day or night.

Christ's saving work on earth was something that only He could do. As God-made-man, He enabled sinful human beings to know and love Him, and, through Him, the Father. We can neither free ourselves from our sins nor know, without Christ and His Revelation, exactly how to please the Father. Through His Spirit, given in Baptism, we receive power; and through His Church, in every age, Truth, to guide us.

The Lord does not give great tasks to those unwilling to fulfil ordinary tasks. If people are not willing to look after their own relations - especially old parents, and young children - they are not going to be able to speak up with confidence, to other people, about the Christian life being a way of self-giving and charity.

Everyone receives a just judgement, at death. The Blessed Trinity, our God, is infinitely compassionate and merciful, but does not over-ride our freedom, by which we choose to follow the path to life, opened by Christ, or choose to walk away, to sin, and to end in the Abyss, in a disaster of our own making.

To be trapped in sinful ways, alienated from God, and helpless to bring about lasting change, is like being trapped on a rocky island, surrounded by a deep Abyss. Only if someone is parachuted in to save people there can they be helped to safety. And that is what Christ did, by coming to our world as God-made-man

Whether a person becomes careless about his spiritual life, or deliberately sinful, his soul can become like a neglected garden: unpleasant for God to look upon. That person is loved by God, yet appears horrible, compared with holy souls. It's as stark and tragic a contrast as between a neglected garden, full of rubbish and rotting woodwork, and a renovated garden which has flower-beds, trees, and all sorts of features to delight the eye and to bring peace.