Christian

Post N° 63

Part II PRACTICES OF CHRISTIAN PERFECTION1

The Divine Master's Program

13. Christian perfection consists:

•1.
in willing to become a saint: "If any man will come after Me"; •2. in
self-denial: "Let him deny himself"; •3. in suffering: "Let him take up
his cross"; •4. in doing: "Let him follow Me. "

14.
If anyone, not many a one, shows that the elect who are willing to be
made conformable to the crucified Christ by carrying their cross are
few in number. It would cause us to faint away from grief to learn how
surprisingly small is their number.

It is so small that among
ten thousand people there is scarcely one to be found, as was revealed
to several Saints, among whom St Simon Stylita, referred to by the holy
Abbot Nilus, followed by St Basil, St. Ephrem and others. So small,
indeed, that if God willed to gather them together, He would have to
cry out as He did of yore through the voice of a prophet: "Come ye
together one by one" (Is. 27, 12), one from this province and one from
that kingdom.

I -- THE DESIRE TO BECOME A SAINT

15.
If anyone wills: if a person has a real and definite determination and
is prompted not by natural feelings, habit, self-love, personal
interest or human respect but by an all-masterful grace of the Holy
Ghost which is not communicated indiscriminately: "it is not given to
all men to understand this mystery" (Matt. 13, 11). In fact, only a
privileged number of men receive this practical knowledge of the
mystery of the Cross. For that man who climbs up to Calvary and lets
himself be nailed on the Cross with Jesus in the heart of his own
country must be a brave man, a hero, a resolute man, one who is lifted
up in God, who treats as muck both the world and hell, as well as his
very body and his own will. He must be resolved to relinquish all
things, to undertake anything and to suffer everything for Jesus.

Understand
this, dear Friends of the Cross, should there be anyone among you who
has not this firm resolve, he is just limping along on one foot, flying
with one wing, and undeserving of your company since he is not worthy
to be called a Friend of the Cross, for we must love the Cross as Jesus
Christ loved it "with a great heart and a willing mind" (2 Mach. 1, 3).
That kind of half-hearted will is enough to spoil the whole flock like
a sheep with the scurvy. If any such one has slipped into your fold
through the contaminated door of the world, then in the name of the
crucified Christ, drive him out as you would a wolf from your sheepfold.

16.
"If anyone will come after Me": for I have humbled Myself and reduced
Myself to mere nothingness in such a way that I made Myself a worm
rather than a man: "I am a worm and no man" (Ps. 21, 7). After Me: for
if I came into the world, it was only to espouse the Cross: "Behold I
am come" (Ps. 39, 8; Heb. 10, 7-9); to set the cross in My heart of
hearts: "In the midst of my heart" (Ps. 39, 9); to love it from the
days of my youth: "I have loved it from my youth" (Wisdom 8, 2); only
to long for it all the days of my life: "how straitened I am" (Luke 12,
50); only to bear it with a joy I preferred even to the joys and
delights that heaven and earth could offer: "Who, having joy set before
him, endured the cross" (Heb. 12, 2); and, finally, not to be satisfied
until I had expired in its divine embrace.

II SELF-DENIAL

17.
Therefore, if anyone wants to come after Me, annihilated and crucified,
he must glory as I did only in the poverty, humiliation and suffering
of My Cross: "let him deny himself" (Matt. 16, 24).

Far be from
the Company of the Friends of the Cross those who pride themselves in
suffering, the worldly-wise, elated geniuses and self-conceited
individuals who are stubborn and puffed-up with their lights and
talents. Far be they from us, those endless talkers who make plenty of
noise but bring forth no other fruit than vain glory. Far from us those
high-browed devotees everywhere displaying the self-sufficient pride of
Lucifer: "I am not like the rest!" (Luke 18, 11). Far be from us those
who must always justify themselves when blamed resist when attacked and
exalt themselves when humbled.

Be careful not to admit into your
fellowship those frail, sensitive persons who are afraid of the
slightest pin-prick, who sob and sigh when faced with the lightest
suffering, who have never experienced a hair-shirt, a discipline or any
other penitential instrument, and who with their fashionable devotions,
mingle the most artful delicacy and the most refined lack of
mortification.

III -- SUFFERING.

18.
Let him take up his cross, the one that is his. Let this man or this
woman, rarely to be found and worth more than the entire world (Prov.
31, 10-31), take up with joy, fervently clasp in his arms and bravely
set upon his shoulders this cross that is his own and not that of
another; his own cross, the one that My Wisdom designed for him in
every detail of number, weight and measurement; his own cross whose
four dimensions, its length, breadth, thickness and height (Eph. 3,
18), I very accurately gauged with My own hands; his own cross which
all out of love for him I carved from a section of the very Cross I
bore on Calvary; his cross, the grandest of all the gifts I have for My
chosen ones on earth; his cross, made up in its thickness of temporal
loss, humiliation, disdain, sorrow, illness and spiritual trial which
My Providence will not fail to supply him with every day of his life;
his cross, made up in its length of a definite period of days or months
when he will have to bear with slander or be helplessly stretched out
on a bed of pain, or forced to beg, or else a prey to temptation,
dryness, desolation and many another mental anguish; his cross, made up
in its breadth of hard and bitter situations stirred up for him by his
relatives, friends or servants; his cross, finally, made up in its
depth of secret sufferings which I will have him endure nor will I
allow him any comfort from created beings, for by My order they will
turn from him too and even join Me in making him suffer.

19.
Let him carry it, and not drag it, not shoulder it off, not tighten it,
nor hide it. Let him hold it high in hand, without impatience or
peevish Ness, without voluntary complaint or grumbling, without
dividing or softening, without shame or human respect. Let him place it
on his forehead and say with St. Paul: "God forbid that I should glory
save in the Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ" (Gal 6, 14) Let him carry
it on his shoulders, after the example of Jesus Christ, and make it his
weapon to victory and the sceptre of his empire (Is. 9, 16)

Let
him root it in his heart and there change it into a fiery bush, burning
day and night with the pure love of God, without being consumed.

20.
The cross: it is the cross he must carry for there is nothing more
necessary, more useful, more agreeable and more glorious than suffering
for Jesus Christ.

21. All of you are sinners
and there is not a single one who is not deserving of hell; I myself
deserve it the most. These sins of ours must be punished either here or
hereafter. If they are punished in this world, they will not be
punished in the world to come.

If we agree to God's punishing
here below, this punishment will be dictated by love. For mercy, which
holds sway in this world, will mete out the punishment, and not strict
justice. This punishment will be light and momentary, blended with
merit and sweetness and followed up with reward both in time and
eternity.

22. But if the punishment due to our
sins is held over for the next world, then God's avenging justice,
which means fire and blood will see to the punishing. What horrible
punishment! How incomprehensible, how unspeakable! "Who knoweth the
power of thy anger?" (Ps. 89, 11). Punishment devoid of mercy (James 2,
13), pity, mitigation or merit, without limit and without end. Yes,
without end! That mortal sin of a moment that you committed, that
deliberate evil thought which now escapes your memory, the word that is
gone with the wind, that act of such short duration against God's law
-- they shall all be punished for an eternity, punished with the devils
of hell, as long as God is God! The God of vengeance will have no pity
on your torments or your sobs and tears, violent enough to cleave the
rocks. Suffering and still more suffering, without merit, without mercy
and without end!

23. Do we think of this, my
dear Brothers and Sisters, when we have some trial to undergo here
below? Blessed indeed are we who have the privilege of exchanging an
eternal and fruitless penalty for a temporary and meritorious
suffering, just by patiently carrying our cross. What debts we still
have to pay! How many sins we have committed which, despite a sincere
confession and heartfelt contrition, will have to be atoned for in
Purgatory for many a century, simply because in this world we were
satisfied with a few insignificant penances! Let us settle our debts
with good grace here below in cheerfully bearing our crosses, for in
the world to come everything must be expiated, even the idle word
(Matt. 12, 36) and even to the last farthing. If we could lay hands on
the devil's death-register in which he has noted down all our sins and
the penalty to be paid, what a heavy debit we would find and how
joyfully we would suffer many years here on earth rather than a single
day in the world to come.

24. Do you not
flatter yourselves, Friends of the Cross, that you are, or that you
want to be, the friends of God? Be firmly resolved then to drink of the
chalice which you must necessarily drink if you wish to enjoy the
friendship of God. "They drank the chalice of the Lord and became the
friends of God" (Common of Apostles, Lesson 7). The beloved Benjamin
had the chalice while his brothers had only the wheat (Gen. 44, 1-4).
The disciple whom Jesus preferred had his Master's heart, went up with
Him to Calvary and drank of His chalice. "Can you drink my chalice?"
(Matt 20, 22). To desire God's glory is good, indeed, but to desire it
and pray for it without being resolved to suffer all things is mere
folly and senseless asking. "You know not what you ask (Matt. 20, 22) .
. . you must undergo much suffering" (Acts 14, 21): you must, it is
necessary, it is indispensable! We can enter the kingdom of heaven only
at the price of many crosses and tribulations.

25.
You take pride in being God's children and you do well; but you should
also rejoice in the lashes your good Father has given you and in those
He still means to give you; for He scourges every one of His children
(Prov. 3, 11; Heb. 13, 5-6; Apoc. 3, 19). If you are not of the
household of His beloved sons, then -- how unfortunate! what a
calamity! -- you are, as St. Augustine says, listed with the reprobate.
Augustine also says: "The one that does not mourn like a stranger and
wayfarer in this world cannot rejoice in the world to come as a citizen
of heaven" (Sermon 31, 5 and 6). If God the Father does not send you
worth-while crosses from time to time, that is because He no longer
cares for you and is angry at you. He considers you a stranger, an
outsider undeserving of His hospitality, or an unlawful child who has
no right to share in his father's estate and no title to his father's
supervision and discipline.

26. Friends of the
Cross, disciples of a crucified God, the mystery of the Cross is a
mystery unknown to the Gentiles, repudiated by the Jews and spurned by
both heretics and bad Catholics, yet it is the great mystery which you
must learn to practice at the school of Jesus Christ and which you can
learn only at His School. You would look in vain for any philosopher
who taught it in the Academies of ancient times; you would ask in vain
either the senses or reason to throw any light on it, for Jesus alone,
through His triumphant grace, is able to teach you this mystery and
make you relish it.

Become proficient, therefore, in this
super-eminent branch of learning under such a skilful Master. Having
this knowledge, you will be possessed of all other branches of
learning, for it surpassingly comprises them all. The Cross is
our-natural as well as our supernatural philosophy. It is our divine
and mysterious theology. It is our philosopher-stone which, by dint of
patience, is able to transmute the grossest of metals into precious
ones, the sharpest pain into delight, poverty into wealth and the
deepest humiliation into glory. He amongst you who knows how to carry
his cross, though he know not A from B, towers above all others in
learning.

Listen to the great St. Paul, after his return from
the third heaven where he was initiated into mysteries which even the
Angels had not learned. He proclaims that he knows nothing and wants to
know nothing but Jesus Christ crucified (1 Cor. 2, 2). You can rejoice,
then if you happen to be a poor man without any schooling or a poor
woman deprived of intellectual attainments, for if you know how to
suffer with joy you are far more learned than a doctor of the Sorbonne
who is unable to suffer as you do.

27. You are
members of Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 6, 15; 12, 27; Eph. 5, 30). What an
honour! But, also, what need for suffering this entails! When the Head
is crowned with thorns should the members be wearing a laurel of roses?
When the Head is jeered at and covered with mud from Calvary's road
should its members be enthroned and sprayed with perfume? When the Head
has no pillow on which to rest, should its members be reclining on soft
feathers? What an unheard of monster such a one would be! No, no, dear
companions of the Cross make no mistake. The Christians you see around
you, fashionably attired, super-sensitive, excessively haughty and
sedate, are neither true disciples nor true members of the crucified
Jesus. To think otherwise would be an insult to your thorn-crowned Head
and His Gospel truth. My God! How many would-be Christians there are
who imagine they are members of the Saviour when in reality they are
His most insidious persecutors, for while blessing themselves with the
sign of the Cross, they crucify Him in their hearts.

If you are
led by the spirit of Jesus and are living the same life with Him, your
thorn-crowned Head, then you must look forward to nothing but thorns,
nails and lashes, in a word, to nothing but a cross. A real disciple
needs to be treated as his Master was, a member as its Head. And if the
Head should offer you, as He offered St. Catherine of Siena, the choice
between a crown of thorns and a crown of roses, do as she did and grasp
the crown of thorns, fastening it tightly to your brow in the likeness
of Jesus.

28. You are aware of the fact that
you are living temples of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 6, 19) and that, like
living stones (1 Pet. 2, 5) you are to be placed by the God of love in
the heavenly Jerusalem He is building. You must expect then to be
shaped, cut and chiselled under the hammer of the Cross, otherwise you
would remain unpolished stone, of no value at all, to be disregarded
and cast aside. Do not cause the hammer to recoil when it strikes you.
Yield to the chisel that is carving you and the hand that is shaping
you. It may be that this skilful and loving Architect wants to make you
a cornerstone in His eternal edifice, one of His most faithful
portraits in the heavenly kingdom. So let Him see to it. He loves you,
He really loves you; He knows what He is doing, He has experience. Love
is behind every one of His telling strokes; nor will a single stroke
miscarry unless your impatience deflects it.

29.
At times the Holy Spirit compares the cross to a winnowing that clears
the good grain from the chaff and dust (Matt. 3, 13; Luke 3, 17). Like
grain in the winnowing, then, let yourself be shaken up and tossed
about without resistance, for the Father of the household is winnowing
you and will soon have you in His harvest He also likens the cross to a
fire whose intense heat burns rust off iron. God is a devouring fire
(Deut. 4, 24; 9, 3; Heb. 13, 29) dwelling in our souls through His
Cross, purifying them yet not consuming them, exemplified in the past
in a burning bush (Ex. 3, 2-3). He likens it at times to the crucible
of a forge where gold is refined (Prov. 17, 3; Eccli. 2, 5) and dross
vanishes in smoke, but, in the processing, the precious metal must be
tried by fire while the baser constituents go up in smoke and flame.
So, too. in the crucible of tribulation and temptation, true Friends of
the Cross are purified by their constancy in suffering while the
enemies of the Cross vanish in smoke by their impatience and murmurings.

30.
Behold, dear Friends of the Cross, before you a great cloud of
witnesses (Heb. 12, 1-2) who silently testify that what I assert is the
truth. For instance, consider Abel, a righteous man, who was slain by
his own brother, then Abraham, a righteous man, who journeyed on the
earth like a wanderer; Lot, a righteous man, who was driven from his
own country; Jacob, a righteous man, who was persecuted by his own
brother; Tobias, a righteous man, who was stricken with blindness; Job,
a righteous man, who was pauperised, humiliated and covered with sores
from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet.

31.
Consider the countless Apostles and Martyrs who were bathed in their
own blood, the countless Virgins and Confessors who were pauperised,
humiliated, exiled and cast aside. Like St. Paul they fervently
proclaim: Behold our beloved Jesus, "Author and Finisher of the faith"
(Heb. 12, 2) we put in Him and in His Cross; it was necessary for Him
to suffer and so to enter through the Cross into His glory (Luke 24,
26).

There at the side of Jesus consider Mary, who had never
known either original or actual sin, yet whose tender, immaculate Heart
was pierced with a sharp sword even to its very depths. If I had time
to dwell on the Passion of Jesus and Mary, I could prove that our
sufferings are naught compared to theirs.

32.
Who, then, would dare claim exemption from the cross? Who would refuse
to rush to the very place where he knows he will find a cross awaiting
him? Who would refuse to borrow the words of the martyr, St. Ignatius:
"Let fire and gallows, wild beasts and all the torments of the devil
assail me, so that I may rejoice in the possession of Jesus Christ. "

33.
If you have not the patience to suffer and the generosity to bear your
cross like the chosen ones of God, then you will have to trudge under
its weight, grumbling and fretting like reprobates; like the two
animals that dragged the Ark of the Covenant, lowing as they went (1
Kings 6, 12); like Simon the Cyrenaean who unwillingly put his hand to
the very Cross of Christ (Matt. 27, 32; Mark 15, 21), complaining while
he carried it. You will be like the impenitent thief who from the
summit of his cross plunged headlong into the depths of the abyss.

No,
the cursed earth on which we live cannot give us happiness. We can see
none too clearly in this benighted land. We are never perfectly calm on
this troubled sea. We are never without warfare in a world of
temptation and battlefields. We cannot escape scratches on a
thorn-covered earth. Both elect and reprobate must bear their cross
here, either willingly or unwillingly. Remember these words:

"Three
crosses stand on Calvary's height One must be chosen, so choose aright;
Like a saint you must suffer, or a penitent thief, Or like a reprobate,
in endless grief. "

This means that if you will not suffer
gladly as Jesus did, or patiently like the penitent thief, then you
must suffer despite yourself like the impenitent thief. You will have
to drain the bitterest chalice even to the dregs, and with no hope of
relief through grace. You will have to bear the entire weight of your
cross, and without the powerful help of Jesus Christ. Then, too, you
will have that awful weight to bear which the devil will add to your
cross, by means of the impatience the cross will cause you. After
sharing the impenitent thief's unhappiness here on earth, you will meet
him again in the fires of hell.

34. But if you
suffer as you should, your cross will be a sweet yoke (Matt. 11, 30),
for Christ will share it with you. Your soul will be borne on it as on
a pair of wings to the portals of Heaven. It will be the mast on your
ship guiding you happily and easily to the harbour of salvation.

Carry
your cross with patience: a cross patiently borne will be your light in
spiritual darkness, for he knows naught who knows not how to suffer
(Eccli. 34, 9).

Carry your cross with joy and you will be
inflamed with divine love, for only in suffering can we dwell in the
pure love of Christ.

Roses are only gathered from among thorns.
As wood is fuel for the fire, so too is the Cross the only fuel for
God's love. Remember that saying we read in the "Following of Christ":
"Inasmuch as you do violence to yourself, " suffering patiently,
"insofar do you advance" in divine love (Bk. 1, Chap. 15, 11). Do not
expect anything great from those fastidious, slothful souls who refuse
the Cross when it approaches and who do not go in search of any, when
discretion allows.

What are they but untilled soil, which can
produce only thorns because it has not been turned up, harrowed and
furrowed by a judicious labourer. They are like stagnant water which is
unfit for either washing or drinking.

Carry your cross joyfully
and none of your enemies will be able to resist its conquering strength
(Luke 21, 15), while you yourself will enjoy its relish beyond compare.
Yes, indeed, Brethren, remember that the real Paradise here on earth is
to be found in suffering for Jesus. Ask the saints. They will tell you
that they never tasted a banquet so delicious to the soul than when
undergoing the severest torments. St. Ignatius the Martyr said: "Let
all the torments of the devil come upon me!" "Either suffering or
death!", said St. Theresa, and St. Magdalene de Pazzi: "Not death but
suffering!" "May I suffer and be despised for Thy sake, " said Blessed
John of the Cross. In reading the lives of the saints we find many
others speaking in the self-same terms.

Dear Brethren, believe
the Word of God, for the Holy Spirit says: The Cross affords all kinds
of joy to anyone without exception who suffers cheerfully for God (Jas.
1, 2). The joy that springs from the cross is keener than the joy which
a poor person would experience if overladen with an abundance of
riches, than the joy of a peasant who is made ruler of his country,
than the joy of a commander-in chief over the victories he has won,
than the joy of a prisoner released from his fetters. In conclusion,
let us picture the greatest joys to be found here below: the joy of a
crucified person who knows how to suffer not only equals them but even
surpasses them all.

35. Be glad, therefore, and
rejoice when God favours you with one of His choicest crosses, for
without realising it you are being blessed with the greatest gift that
Heaven has, the greatest gift of God. Yes, the cross is God's greatest
gift. If you could only understand this, you would have Masses said,
you would make novenas at the tombs of the saints; you would undertake
long pilgrimages, as did the saints, to obtain this divine gift from
Heaven.

36. The world claims it is madness on
your part, degrading and stupid, rash and reckless. Let the world, in
its blindness, say what it likes. This blindness which is responsible
for a merely human and distorted view of the cross is a source of glory
for us. For every time they provide us with crosses by mocking and
persecuting us, they are simply offering us jewels, setting us upon a
throne and crowning us with laurels.

37. What I
say is but little. Take all the wealth and honours and sceptres and
brilliant diadems of monarchs and princes, says St. John Chrysostom,
they are all insignificant compared with the glory of the Cross; it is
greater even than the glory of the Apostles and the Sacred Writers.
Enlightened by the Holy Spirit, this saintly man goes as far as to say:
"If I were given the preference, I would gladly leave Heaven to suffer
for the God of Heaven. I would prefer the darkness of a dungeon to the
thrones of the highest heaven and the heaviest of crosses to the glory
of the Seraphim. Suffering for me is of greater value than the gift of
miracles, the power to command the infernal spirits, to master the
physical universe, to stop the sun in its course and to raise the dead
to life. Peter and Paul are more glorious in the shackles of a dungeon
than in being lifted to the third heaven and presented with the keys to
Paradise. "

38. In fact, was it not the Cross
that gave Jesus Christ "a name which is above all names; that in the
name of Jesus every knee should bow of those that are in heaven, on
earth and under the earth" (Phil. 2, 9-10). The glory of the one who
knows how to suffer is so great that the radiance of his splendour
rejoices heaven, angels and men and even the God of Heaven. If the
saints in Heaven could still wish for something they would want to
return to earth so as to have the privilege of bearing a cross.

39.
If the cross is covered with such glory on earth, how magnificent it
must be in Heaven. Who could ever understand and tell the eternal
weight of glory we are given when, even for a single instant, we bear a
cross as a cross should be borne (2 Cor. 4, 17)! Who could ever collate
the glory that will be given in Heaven for the crosses and sufferings
we carried for a year, perhaps even for a lifetime.

40.
Evidently, my dear Friends of the Cross, heaven is preparing something
grand for you, as you are told by a great Saint, since the Holy Ghost
has united you so intimately to an object which the whole world so
carefully avoids. Evidently, God wishes to make of you as many saints
as you are Friends of the Cross, if you are faithful to your calling
and dutifully carry your cross as Jesus Christ has carried His.