Mary TV: March 7, 2018 Reflection - The Gift of Faith

 (c)Mateo Ivankovic 2018

 

March 7, 2018
St. Perpetua and St. Felicity

Dear Family of Mary!

In the March 2 message Our Lady speaks to us of the three Theological Virtues: Faith, Hope and Love. She speaks of them in the most practical of ways. For instance, here is what she says about faith:

 

Everything is easier alongside Him [the Father]. Also, pain lived with Him is easier because faith exists. Faith helps in the pain, and pain without faith leads to despair. Pain lived and offered to God raises up. Did my Son not redeem the world through His painful sacrifice? As His mother I was with Him in the pain and suffering, as I am with all of you. My children, I am with you in life, in suffering, in pain, in joy and in love...(March 2, 2018)

Our Lady tells us that life lived with God is always easier. Everything in life contains challenges, suffering, pain, disappointment, fear. But those things are mitigated by our relationship to the Father. Indeed, Our Lady tells us that even pain is easier when endured with the Father because faith exists. When we have a relationship with the Heavenly Father, we receive faith as a gift. That faith helps us to see everything with different eyes. What could seem to be impossible, endlessly difficult, can become "easier" to bear when we have faith. Indeed, when we offer our pain up to God, it becomes joy, according to Our Lady. It raises us up!!

 

We believe that God exists, and that He has promised many things that will happen in the future. These promises, these truths, give us a context in which to understand our difficulties and pains, and that context helps us bear our difficulties. When we have faith in God we have a strength to live that rises above our difficulties.

 

The Catechism of the Catholic Church describes the Gift of Faith like this:

1814 Faith is the theological virtue by which we believe in God and believe all that he has said and revealed to us, and that Holy Church proposes for our belief, because he is truth itself. By faith "man freely commits his entire self to God."

By faith we commit ourselves entirely to God. We believe that He exists, that He is personally involved in our lives and that He has a wonderful plan for our future. When we have this faith we can give ourselves over to God in a profound way. Then we can face our realities, our pains and sufferings, with a confidence that all will be well, because God is involved, He loves us.
Faith makes everything bearable. Faith makes sense of everything. God exists! And He loves us!
Our Lady continues in the message to tell us that our faith will reveal to us that Jesus saved us by his painful sacrifice. And He gave us Mary as our Mother to be with us in our pains and sacrifices. Her motherly presence is a sign of God's love, and a reason to continue to believe. Our faith is bolstered by Her presence in our lives.
So the Virtue and Gift of Faith is something to be treasured and lived. "Everything is easier alongside Him!" Faith enables us to live alongside God!
In Jesus, Mary and Joseph!
Cathy Nolan
©Mary TV 2018

PS.  Mike Nolan (https://pilgrim-medj.com/ ) is taking a group to Medjugorje on April 2 - 13, 2018!  He has room for more pilgrims and says that the airfares are very reasonable.  If you have been receiving nudges to go to Medjugorje, call Mike at 574-335-9952!!

"Medjugorje is the spiritual center of the world."
Saint John Paul II
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