Propose, Don't Impose

When helping others in their struggle, be gentle and compassionate.  Imitate the mercy of Christ.  We should never impose our beliefs and ideas on others, but propose in a loving way.

Pope Francis recently broached the subject, “Permit me to say that we must be almost obsessive in this matter. We do not want to be presumptuous, imposing ‘our truths.’ What must guide us is the humble yet joyful certainty of those who have been found, touched, and transformed by the Truth who is Christ, ever to be proclaimed.”

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God Has Faith in Us

We often speak of having "faith" in God especially during times of suffering.  Yet we never mention God having faith in us.  God has confidence that we can persevere.  The Holy Father mentioned this recently. 

POPE FRANCIS

“Christ has confidence in young people and entrusts them with the very future of his mission, "Go and make disciples". Go beyond the confines of what is humanly possible and create a world of brothers and sisters.” 

The Pope then emphasized that even though World Youth Day is a celebration for the youth, he also wants to reach out to all generations, so that the message of Jesus is proclaimed loud and clear. 

 

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Offer It Up

In this video, Fr. John Bartunek and Dan Burke talk about what it means to join in the redemption of Christ through suffering. If you are alive, you are suffering in some way. With this video you will gain perspective on that suffering and how you can use it to grow in your relationship with Christ and to aid others in their redemption.

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I Know Where Home Is

This is worth watching. Particularly if at any point today, this week, this month, or this year you were frustrated, exasperated, annoyed, or angry that you didn’t get what you felt you should get done done. Since you’re reading this: today was another day you had to live. To spend with your family, friends, be on this earth. Love someone. Pick up the phone. Write that letter. Send that e-mail of gratitude or contrition. Let the woman on this video convince you: it is a beautiful testimony to redemptive suffering.

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Depression

Depression can cause undo suffering, but there is help.

David Franks writes:

“No dramatic aspect of life, and certainly not depression, can be adequately accounted for without the Christian revelation of Christ. … There is a powerful spiritual reality at play, but the insinuation the sufferer is somehow at fault gets things exactly backward; it is the innocence of the depressed one that is the key. This book descends into crucial details about mental illness, but even more impressively descends into the mystery of this, as of all, suffering.”

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Good Advice

A long time ago in Germany, a man kept a diary. And some of his words are worth sharing today.

The man wrote: “Speak both to the powerful and to every man—whoever he may be—appropriately and without affectation. Use plain language. Receive wealth or prosperity without arrogance, and be ready to let it go. Order your life well in every single act. Behave justly to those who are around you. Be vigilant over your thoughts, so that nothing should steal into them without being well examined.”

“Every moment, focus steadily on doing the task at hand with perfect and simple dignity, and with feelings of affection and freedom and justice. Put away hypocrisy. Put away self-love and discontent with your portion in life. We were made for cooperation, and to act against one another is contrary to nature. Accept correction gladly. Teach without anger. Keep yourself simple, good, pure, serious, a friend of justice, kind, affectionate, and strenuous in all proper acts.”

“Take care never to feel toward those who are inhuman, the way they feel toward other men.”

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We've Become Sheep

When Christian spirituality declines a vacuum is created and the devil enters.  Dr. Peter Kreeft states:

“Well, in Western civilization, at least, there is certainly a moral and religious decline…we’re losing the faith. Europe is already almost lost,” he said. “Nature abhors a vacuum, spiritually as well as physically. So when the Faith weakens, another faith enters, because no one can live without faith, and Islam is a very strong faith. It has its good points; it has its bad points. But when we withdraw from the battlefield, someone else enters. It’s as simple as that.”

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Accept God's Consolation

Sometimes we are afraid to approach God when we suffer.  We become too comfortable in our misery and do not accept the tenderness of the Lord.

The Holy Father recently broached the issue,
“Sometimes I've seen consecrated people who are afraid of God's consolation. Poor men, poor women, they are consumed with sorrow, because they fear God's tenderness. But don't be afraid! Don't be afraid, the Lord is the Lord of consolation, the Lord of tenderness. God is our Father and He says he will behave with us like a mother with her child, with tenderness. Never be afraid of God's consolation!”

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Consecration

Consecration (solemnly commitment or dedication to God) is powerful in battling evil and suffering.  In recent decades the Church has been embroiled is serious sin by some of her members.  As a result the Holy Father went on to consecrate Vatican City State to St. Michael “asking him to defend us against evil and to banish it.”   

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Conscience

Disregarding conscience causes unneeded pain and suffering.  

According to pope Francis we must learn to listen more to our conscience. Be careful, however: this does not mean we ought to follow our ego, do whatever interests us, whatever suits us, whatever pleases us. That is not conscience. Conscience is the interior space in which we can listen to and hear the truth, the good, the voice of God. It is the inner place of our relationship with Him, who speaks to our heart and helps us to discern, to understand the path we ought to take, and once the decision is made, to move forward, to remain faithful.

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