Medjugorje Message: September 25, 2017
Dear children! I am calling you to be generous in renunciation, fasting and prayer for all those who are in temptation, and are your brothers and sisters. In a special way I am imploring you to pray for priests and for all the consecrated, that they may love Jesus still more fervently; that the Holy Spirit may fill their hearts with joy; that they may witness Heaven and Heavenly mysteries. Many souls are in sin, because there are not those who sacrifice themselves and pray for their conversion. I am with you and am praying that your hearts may be filled with joy. Thank you for having responded to my call.
River of Light
October 2017
Our Lady’s message this month contains a specific instruction and plea: “I am calling you to be generous in renunciation, fasting and prayer for all those who are in temptation, and are your brothers and sisters.” This request for our intercession is striking, as it joins together the traditional Lenten “trifecta” of prayer, fasting and renunciation—a powerhouse of praxis—with the intention specifically “earmarked” not for our own conversion or generalized global needs (which are great at this time)—but “for those who are in temptation, and are your brothers and sisters.” Of course, this intention covers a vast field! Every time we pray the Lord’s Prayer (Our Father), we ask: “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” Clearly, the temptation to sin and evil is pervasive in our present cultural climate, no matter where we live or “who we are” in the eyes of the world—from the least to the greatest in power, prestige, financial status, education or religiosity. Our Lady is asking for “generosity” in our spiritual practices undertaken for the sake of our “brothers and sisters” who are in temptation.
Who are these “brothers and sisters”? Sacred Scripture answers the question definitively, from Genesis through Revelation—from Cain asking God, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (when murdered Abel went missing), to the disciples asking Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?” (thus eliciting from him the parable of the Good Samaritan). The answer is simple: ALL HUMAN BEINGS WITHOUT EXCEPTION are our “brothers and sisters”—and we are each “our brother’s (and sister’s) keeper.” For example, our brothers, Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un, are both “in temptation” right now, as the escalating insults and saber-rattling rhetoric between them endangers the peace of whole nations with the threat of nuclear war. Both of these men need our “renunciation, fasting and prayer” to defuse the temptation of satanic ego toward a sin that would deliver the whole global community into the “evil” of violence and destruction.
From the highest echalons of world government and celebrity stardom to the lowest rungs of poverty and anonymity, ALL of our brothers and sisters on the planet suffer temptation to sin, to a greater or lesser degree, for all of us are subject to the Human Condition in which the False Self battles for control and dominion over our thoughts, words, choices and behavior, to make us slaves of the selfish ego and narcissistic “self-will run riot” rather than obedient to the self-emptying love of the Divine Will. Our Lady’s call to generous “renunciation” means first of all the renouncing of our own selfish will in matters big and small, throughout our daily life and in all our relations. Fasting and prayer should accompany this renunciation.
Next, Our Lady narrows the focus of her request, saying: “In a special way I am imploring you to pray for priests and for all the consecrated, that they may love Jesus still more fervently; that the Holy Spirit may fill their hearts with joy; that they may witness Heaven and Heavenly mysteries.” In Medjugorje, Our Lady has stressed the need to pray for our priests—for Pope Francis, all the bishops and cardinals in the world, our pastors and parish priests, retired priests (many of whom continue to serve as they’re able), and priests who are elderly, sick and dying. With the uniqueness of the priestly vocation and the situation of overworked/ understaffed parishes, many of us are so emotionally “removed” from our priests that we’re oblivious to the suffering and loneliness they experience. Their pain goes unnoticed and unknown.
As with all of our “brothers and sisters who are in temptation,” if we only have “eyes to see and ears to hear,” we can often observe the signs of distress, sadness or pain in our beloved priests. A noticeable aloofness, apathy or shortness in their attitude may signal depression, anxiety, fear or anger that needs healing; it may represent the stress and burnout of overwork, or any of a thousand inner and outer “temptations” they may be suffering in silence. During her monthly message to Mirjana for unbelievers on the second day of each month, Our Lady often specifically asks us to pray for our “shepherds.” Our priests are not immune or exempt from the trials of ordinary human life, including temptations to betray their professed faith, their vows, and the holiness of life to which we are all called. Priests, like the rest of us, can be tempted to live and act in the world as “unbelievers”—as those whom Our Lady says “have not yet experienced the love of God.” And yet our world stands in desperate need of the sacraments of the Church and the exemplary lifestyle of selfless service that they provide.
Mary’s plea for our intercession includes not only priests, but “all the consecrated“—everyone who has formally dedicated their life to Church and ministry, including men and women religious, deacons, and all in holy orders. She “implores” us to pray for a threefold good: “that they may love Jesus still more fervently; that the Holy Spirit may fill their hearts with joy; that they may witness Heaven and Heavenly mysteries.” These three great goods are the first to weaken and disappear when we are “in temptation.” Our ardent love for Jesus cools as we fall into greater self-absorption and self-centeredness; our hearts lose all true joy which comes from the Holy Spirit, replaced by the sensual or mental pursuit of lesser, transitory “pleasures” or “happiness”; and we no longer “witness Heaven and Heavenly mysteries” by our enthusiastic participation at the Mass, eagerly celebrating the sacraments of reconciliation and Eucharist, praying the rosary, reading scripture, or sharing our faith with others. Just as these things wane and weaken in our lives when we are in sin or temptation, they also affect priests and nuns, bishops and cardinals, deacons and secular tertiaries in the very same way, for we are all HUMAN.
Our Lady concludes by saying, “Many souls are in sin, because there are not those who sacrifice themselves and pray for their conversion. I am with you and am praying that your hearts may be filled with joy.” Here Our Lady returns to her original point: the need for all of us to both pray AND sacrifice ourselves for the intention of our brothers and sisters in the Body of Christ—i.e. the whole human family—who are “in temptation” and “in sin.” She is challenging the extreme individualism of our age with the truth of our ONENESS in the Mystical Body—the interconnected web of Being that both science and theology now recognize as the ultimate nature of Reality, the foundational unity and interrelatedness that calls us out of ourselves and our own narrow individual interests, to pray, fast and renounce selfish ego for the sake of our neighbors’ conversion.
Returning to our example of Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un: How much more effective might be our response of “renunciation, fasting and prayer” for these two presidents (who are manifestly in danger of temptation and sin) than our usual response of idle speculation, heated debate, verbal criticism, and cyber-bashing of the men, their defenders or their opponents? Clearly Our Lady calls us to the former prayerful response. Likewise, when we encounter priests—from Pope Francis to our own pastors and parochial vicars—whom we feel are “in temptation” or “in sin,” our response must be to “sacrifice ourselves and pray for their conversion“….not “trash-talk” them in judgment and condemnation.
Our Lady’s final assurance—“I am praying that your hearts may be filled with joy“—echoes her earlier prayer for priests and consecrated people: “that the Holy Spirit may fill their hearts with joy.” Leon Bloy wrote: “Joy is the most infallible sign of the presence of God.” It is the surest indication of God alive in us. Indeed, a heart full of the wholly interior soul-force that is authentic JOY is not “in temptation” or “in sin,” for the two cannot coexist; temptation is a joy-stealer and sin a joy-killer, for they contradict and conflict with this inner, divinely-given soul-force. Joy is the greatest evangelizer, for the Good News we carry should fill us with a contagious joy that everyone will “catch,” just from being in our presence.
For this reason, three of our October saints—Teresa of Avila, Francis of Assisi, and Therese of Lisieux—all taught and exemplified radiant JOY. For Teresa, “a sad nun is a bad nun“; she said, “God save us from gloomy saints!” Francis of Assisi forbade his friars to go about in public with long faces, for “the joy of the Lord must be your strength.” (Nehemiah 8:10) And St. Therese of Lisieux wrote, “Joy is not found in the things which surround us, but lives only in the soul….There is no joy like that known by the truly poor in spirit.” Let us pray for all our brothers and sisters who lack this interior joy of the Holy Spirit—be they presidents or priests, nuns or neighbors. And let us add some fasting and renunciation to our prayerful intercession, that we may ALL experience conversion of heart!
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October 4: St. Francis of Assisi & the Franciscan Way
These Hallmarks of the Franciscan Order can be practiced by anyone:
- Simplicity — A spirituality that is genuine, without pretense
- Poverty — Love of Gospel poverty builds confidence in God and internal freedom
- Humility — The truth of who we are in the eyes of God, without pride or arrogance
- Sense of Minority — Recognition that we are servants, not superior to anyone
- Complete Abandonment to God — Trusting in God’s unconditional love
- Daily Conversion — Beginning again the process of changing to be more like Jesus
- Transformation — What God does for us, when we are open and willing
- Peacemaking — Being messengers of peace, like Francis
“Let us begin again, for up until now we have done little or nothing….I have done what is mine to do; may God show you what is yours to do.” — Dying words of St. Francis
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“Make Me A Channel of Your Peace” : Notes on Nonviolence
If men really wanted peace they would sincerely ask God for it and He would give it to them. But why should He give the world a peace which it does not really desire? The peace the world pretends to desire is really no peace at all. To some, peace merely means the liberty to exploit other people without fear of retaliation or interference. To others peace means the freedom to rob others without interruption. To still others it means the leisure to devour the goods of the earth without being compelled to interrupt their pleasures to feed those whom their greed is starving….God left them with what they desired, for their idea of peace was only another form of war….Instead of loving what you think is peace, love other persons and love God above all. And instead of hating the people you think are warmakers, hate the appetites and the disorder in your own soul, which are the causes of war. If you love peace, then hate injustice, hate tyranny, hate greed—but hate these things in yourself, not in another. — Thomas Merton, O.C.S.O.
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The root of violence is the illusion of separation—from God, from Being itself, from being somehow one with everyone and everything. Most of our conflicts arise from a very fragile sense of self. When we’re full of fear, the enemy is everywhere. We endlessly look for the problem outside of ourselves so we can expel or exterminate it. If a prophetic peacemaker attempts to take our chosen object of hatred away from us, we turn our hatred on them. Jesus, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., and many others were persecuted or killed because they challenged the myth of scapegoating. If we don’t own our own evil, we will always project it elsewhere and attack it there. Only people who recognize their own evil, or at least their complicity in evil, stop this unconscious scapegoating pattern. Their experience of radical union with God makes it possible for them to own their own shadow, their own capacity for evil, and not need to hate it in other people. — Richard Rohr, OFM
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Practicing nonviolence means claiming our fundamental identity as the beloved sons and daughters of the God of peace, and thus going forth into the world of war as peacemakers to love every other human being. The problem is: we don’t know who we are. The challenge then is to remember who we are, and thus be nonviolent to ourselves and others. Living nonviolence requires daily meditation, contemplation, study, concentration, and mindfulness. Just as mindlessness leads to violence, steady mindfulness and conscious awareness of our true identities lead to nonviolence and peace. The deeper we go into mindful nonviolence, the more we live the truth of our identity as sisters and brothers of one another, and sons and daughters of the God of peace. The social, economic, and political implications of this practice are astounding: if we are sons and daughters of a loving Creator, then every human being is our sister and brother, and we can never hurt anyone on earth again, much less be silent in the face of war, starvation, racism, sexism, nuclear weapons, systemic injustice, and environmental destruction. — Fr. John Dear
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Racism is a poison of the soul. It’s the ugly, original sin of our country, an illness that has never fully healed. Blending it with the Nazi salute, the relic of a regime that murdered millions, compounds the obscenity.” — Archbishop Charles Chaput
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The world is drenched in mutual slaughter….Held to be a crime when committed by individuals, homicide is called a virtue when committed by the state. — St. Cyprian
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Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons and daughters of God….You have heard how it was said, “You must love your neighbor and hate your enemy”; but I say to you, Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons and daughters of your Father in heaven. — Jesus (Matthew 5:9, 43-45)
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Wisdom from Pope Francis
I wish peace to every man, woman and child, and I pray that the image and likeness of God in each person will enable us to acknowledge one another as sacred gifts endowed with immense dignity. Especially in situations of conflict, let us respect this, our “deepest dignity,” and make active nonviolence our way of life.
— 50th World Day of Peace, 1/1/17
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Mark Your Calendar
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To reject the contemplative dimension of any religion is to reject the religion itself, however loyal one may be to its externals and rituals. This is because the contemplative dimension is the heart and soul of every religion. It initiates the movement into higher states of consciousness. The great wisdom teachings of the Vedas, Upanishads, Buddhist Sutras, Old and New Testaments, and the Koran bear witness to this truth. Right now there are about two billion Christians on the planet. If a significant portion of them were to embrace the contemplative dimension of the gospel, the emerging global society would experience a powerful surge toward enduring peace. If this contemplative dimension of the Christian religion is not presented, the Gospel is not being adequately preached.
– Fr. Thomas Keating, OCSO
