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God delights in our love, proved by our devotion in prayer; but He delights in the charity in our hearts, when we freely choose to leave our devotions to attend to a neighbour, whether a person taken ill, or a husband arriving home and deserving a kind welcome.

A man who expects to hear the truth about sin and salvation, Church and evangelisation, holiness and Heaven, will often be disappointed at ecumenical gatherings where people are afraid of appearing divisive. They stick to safe subjects such as consumerism, pollution, nuclear war, and global warming, while people long to be helped to understand the meaning of 'Church', or helped in their personal spiritual journeys.

Christ's saving work on earth was something that only He could do. As God-made-man, He enabled sinful human beings to know and love Him, and, through Him, the Father. We can neither free ourselves from our sins nor know, without Christ and His Revelation, exactly how to please the Father. Through His Spirit, given in Baptism, we receive power; and through His Church, in every age, Truth, to guide us.

If we are full of self-pity, no matter how justified it seems, we become inward-looking, focussed not upon Christ or our neighbour but our own feelings of misery. This is spiritually harmful - as if we are sitting on the edge of the Abyss, in danger of falling, not like those other suffering people who say: "I can't do much good, but I'll do the little I can" - on the way to Heaven.

It is sad to see some Bishops squabbling about comparatively unimportant matters, while, close by, people are falling into the pit - into Hell - because of their own freely-chosen actions. Those sinful people who died unrepentant are responsible for their fate; but they were not helped by Bishops who might have taught them the Faith in its fullness, with fervour, and so steered them away from danger.

When the first human beings said "No" to God, the all-good, beautiful and holy, it was as if that cry of disobedience reverberated round the whole universe, so shocking was their pride and hard-heartedness. The whole of nature was damaged by the consequences of that Original Sin, at what we call 'the Fall'; and suffering entered our world.

Most Catholics have heard the phrase, "The Real Presence"; but few have thought it through. Those who do so are aware the Almighty God, the Son of God, chooses to be Really Present in a special, sacramental way, in each of our Catholic churches! Those who know this kneel, bow, and adore Christ. Those who don't know, or don't care, chat and laugh as if in a pub or a cafe.

Everyone receives a just judgement, at death. The Blessed Trinity, our God, is infinitely compassionate and merciful, but does not over-ride our freedom, by which we choose to follow the path to life, opened by Christ, or choose to walk away, to sin, and to end in the Abyss, in a disaster of our own making.

To be trapped in sinful ways, alienated from God, and helpless to bring about lasting change, is like being trapped on a rocky island, surrounded by a deep Abyss. Only if someone is parachuted in to save people there can they be helped to safety. And that is what Christ did, by coming to our world as God-made-man

The gift we are given at Baptism is the gift of the Holy Spirit, Who can lift our souls up to Heaven, across the gulf, when we die. A person who has become careless or disobedient and who has driven away the Spirit of Love, and no longer lives in a state of grace, will be lost, at death, in the Abyss, unable to rely on the Holy Spirit, having refused Him.

Any wife ought to say what she believes is right, in conversation with her husband, but in obedience to Christ and the Apostles she ought always to speak with respect, and bearing in mind the fact that, in God's sight, her husband is the head of the household; and God wants her to honour him as the head, according to the tradition.

Jesus Christ is swift to console His friends in their heartache, pain or exhaustion. If we call out to Him in faith and humility, asking for the privilege of a spiritual Communion, He is very close to us, bringing peace that only He can give, and guiding us in our actions by the inspiration of His Holy Spirit.

Though we cannot see them, the other members of the Church, of Heaven and Purgatory, are united with us in praise of the Father, through Jesus Christ, at every Mass. We can take comfort from the truth, that we are already doing, on earth, in our prayer, what we hope to do in Eternity, when we are perfectly joyful in God's Presence.

Christ sees every tiny act of charity that we do for love of Him. He sees each one as being like a personal gift to Him - or like a rose-petal thrown by a child in His honour, where He is Present in the Most Blessed Sacrament, as the Sacred Host in carried along in a monstrance, by a priest, for the faithful to venerate and adore.

Christ wants us to avoid the ultimate disaster. Christ leads us by love, encouraging us to follow the Way to Heaven, helped by His guidelines and graces; but those who persist in disobedience and foolishness, ignoring His Commandments and decrees, or neglecting prayer, or corrupting others, or being irreverent towards His Sacred Ministers, or persisting, without repentance, in any grave sin, are allowed to follow their own paths. Alas, these lead to the great sewer which carries souls to Hell.

We should work and pray for the Gospel to be spread. It is plain to see, if we look across the world, that a Catholic who has his sins forgiven, and approaches death in the grace of God, with the hope of Heaven, can be at peace, whereas someone not knowing about our loving Creator or His wonderful Son, and expecting to be returned to earth in some other body, to endure further trials on earth, is unlikely to be joyful, and perhaps is terrified.

The Blessed Virgin Mary is dear to the Father, Who admires her loving heart, which caused her to say 'yes' to His plan of salvation. He is glad to see her honoured by the Church.

Christ loves and honours His beloved Mother Mary. He wants us to love and honour her, and to give her special honour in and through the Church. He delights in seeing Popes and Bishops set an example in this, by their sincere prayers and other acts of devotion at Marian shrines, and before images of Our Blessed Lady.

In the Father's sight, it is tragic that many Christians refuse to honour the Virgin Mother of their Saviour. How can they imagine that the perfect son of a perfect mother does not love her, does not honour her, and does not want all His friends to honour her, too? These Christians find out the truth when they die, and lament their previous blindness.

The Blessed Virgin Mary is dear to God the Father. Christ, Son of God and of Mary, loves His Mother and wants her to be loved and honoured. It is tragic, in His sight, that some Christians refuse to honour her. They discover, in Purgatory, the truth about their neglect of her, and they bewail the blindness of their earthly lives.