Friday, December 05, 2014

Mary TV Daily Reflection 12/5/2014


     
(c)Mary TV 2014
The Crystal Halo over St. James Church, a sign of hope!


J.M.J
December 5, 2014

Dear Family of Mary!

December 2, 2014
"Dear children, remember - for I am telling you that love will win. I know that many of you are losing hope because around you, you see suffering, pain, jealousy, envy... But, I am your mother. I am in the Kingdom but am also here with you. My Son is sending me anew to help you. Therefore, do not lose hope, instead, follow me - because the victory of my heart is in the name of God. My beloved Son is thinking of you as He has always thought of you. Believe Him and live Him. He is the Life of the world. My children, to live my Son means to live the Gospel. This is not easy. This means love, forgiveness and sacrifice. This purifies and it opens the Kingdom. Sincere prayer, which is not only words but is a prayer which the heart speaks, will help you. Likewise fasting (will help you), because it is still more of love, forgiveness and sacrifice. Therefore, do not lose hope but follow me. I am imploring you anew to pray for your shepherds so that they may always look to my Son who was the first Shepherd of the world and whose family was the entire world. Thank you."

Do not lose hope!! This is Our Lady's appeal to us. Do not lose hope! She tells us that love will win! Jesus has sent her to us to help us hold on and await the victory. We see the fruit of sin in the world, in the suffering, pain, jealousy, envy and so much more. But love will win! We are called to live the life of Jesus, forgiving, sacrificing, praying, and fasting, all of which is very hard. But love will win! We are called to believe in Jesus, live Jesus, follow Jesus no matter how much opposition we encounter because love will win! Love will win. Do not lose hope!

In the Catechism of the Catholic Church, we read these beautiful words about hope. Let them form our hearts with a desire for the virtue of hope, so necessary in our life with God:

Hope
1817
Hope is the theological virtue by which we desire the kingdom of heaven and eternal life as our happiness, placing our trust in Christ's promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit. "Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful." "The Holy Spirit . . . he poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that we might be justified by his grace and become heirs in hope of eternal life."
 
1818
The virtue of hope responds to the aspiration to happiness which God has placed in the heart of every man; it takes up the hopes that inspire men's activities and purifies them so as to order them to the Kingdom of heaven; it keeps man from discouragement; it sustains him during times of abandonment; it opens up his heart in expectation of eternal beatitude. Buoyed up by hope, he is preserved from selfishness and led to the happiness that flows from charity.  

 1819 Christian hope takes up and fulfills the hope of the chosen people which has its origin and model in the hope of Abraham, who was blessed abundantly by the promises of God fulfilled in Isaac, and who was purified by the test of the sacrifice. "Hoping against hope, he believed, and thus became the father of many nations."
 
1820
Christian hope unfolds from the beginning of Jesus' preaching in the proclamation of the beatitudes. The beatitudes raise our hope toward heaven as the new Promised Land; they trace the path that leads through the trials that await the disciples of Jesus. But through the merits of Jesus Christ and of his Passion, God keeps us in the "hope that does not disappoint." Hope is the "sure and steadfast anchor of the soul . . . that enters . . . where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf." Hope is also a weapon that protects us in the struggle of salvation: "Let us . . . put on the breastplate of faith and charity, and for a helmet the hope of salvation." It affords us joy even under trial: "Rejoice in your hope, be patient in tribulation." Hope is expressed and nourished in prayer, especially in the Our Father, the summary of everything that hope leads us to desire.  

 1821
We can therefore hope in the glory of heaven promised by God to those who love him and do his will. In every circumstance, each one of us should hope, with the grace of God, to persevere "to the end" and to obtain the joy of heaven, as God's eternal reward for the good works accomplished with the grace of Christ. In hope, the Church prays for "all men to be saved." She longs to be united with Christ, her Bridegroom, in the glory of heaven:  

Hope, O my soul, hope. You know neither the day nor the hour. Watch carefully, for everything passes quickly, even though your impatience makes doubtful what is certain, and turns a very short time into a long one. Dream that the more you struggle, the more you prove the love that you bear your God, and the more you will rejoice one day with your Beloved, in a happiness and rapture that can never end.


In Jesus, Mary and Joseph!
Cathy Nolan
©Mary TV 2014







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