September 6, 2010Dear Family of Mary!Dear children; Today I call you to a humble, my children, humble devotion. Your hearts need to be just. May your crosses be your means in the battle against the sins of the present time. May your weapon be patience and boundless love - a love that knows to wait and which will make you capable of recognizing God's signs - that your life, by humble love, may show the truth to all those who seek it in the darkness of lies. My children, my apostles, help me to open the paths to my Son. Once again I call you to pray for your shepherds. Alongside them, I will triumph. Thank you. (October 2, 2010) "May your crosses be your means in the battle against the sins of the present time." This may be the most difficult part of the Christian life to understand and live. It is completely counter-intuitive. How can our set-backs, our trials, our sicknesses and failures be the very things that help us to triumph against the sins of our day? How can misfortune become triumph? It makes no earthly sense. And that is exactly it. It makes no earthly sense. Our temporal existence, our natural lives have a logic. The powerful win, the strong survive, the intelligent prevail. The trouble is that the battle against sin is not an earthly battle. It is a heavenly battle, a supernatural battle in a realm where earthly logic fails. It is a battle against Satan and the evil spirits who would create a kingdom of hate for God, a reality that says no to the Creator. It is a battle against the enemy of all men, who would enthrall us to himself, chaining us to his anti-gospel of hatred, selfishness and death. And the only way to defeat such an enemy is the way of the cross. Jesus showed us that way in His passion. He chose to suffer, to be humiliated, to be mocked and rejected, to be tortured and to die. He chose the Cross as His means in the battle against sin. And He won! If it worked for Jesus, it will work for us. We can choose to battle against sin through our crosses. How does it work? It seems that we are given crosses every day. They may be small, vexing little crosses, like a backache, a headache, a little fight with our spouse, or a traffic jam. But if we embrace the cross we are given, if we enter into it willingly and offer it up to the Father for the sake of souls, miracles will happen. Somewhere, someone will receive the strength to stay clean of drugs for that day, or to have hope in God, or to go to confession. Somewhere the battle against sin will be won in someone's life. That is the way it works. Our willingness to embrace our crosses can win ground for others who need the help. Such a life of intercession goes against all that the world would tell us. It is selfless, humble, forbearing, and generous. Such a life operates on heavenly logic, not earthly logic. But the victories are huge in such a life!! Absolutely huge! We will only know their full extent when we enter the heavenly courts and meet the souls who were helped by our surrender! "May your crosses be your means in the battle against the sins of the present time." Our crosses are tailor made for the sins of our time. God knows how hard it is to go against the prevailing winds. But if we choose to embrace the difficulties of our time, we will help Him to save many souls. Aren't we blessed!! Let's not lose hope, but do exactly what our time presents to us. As Gandalf said to Frodo, when he was ruing the fact that the Ring had come to him, "All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us." It's true. We can't rewrite things so that we have other crosses or other times. We have been given this time in history; we face the sins of our present time. But in our crosses we have been give the means to defeat those sins, just as Frodo was given the cross (the Ring) that would defeat the sins of his time. May we pray for the grace to embrace the crosses of today. In them we will find our victory.In Jesus and Mary!
Cathy Nolan
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