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Just as some people can be trapped at the bottom of a deep cavern in the jungle, so we become alienated from God through sin. But if we turn upwards towards the light offered by Christ, he can lift us into freedom.
When we request prayers of the Saints, we can be sure that their intercessions are fruitful. The Lord hears them, and pours His graces upon the people we've prayed for: people in great need of help. It's as though a spotlight shines from Heaven on their behaviour, to help them to change it - though some decide to ignore Heaven's help.
To love Christ, to know Him, to depend on Him, and to trust in Him in every circumstance is to allow Him to fill one's life with His light, which can radiate outwards to enlighten other people.
Christ greeted me with His arms open wide in a loving gesture, showing His delight, on my child's birthday, that I have welcomed every child I have conceived, and have been grateful for God's gift of help.
Christ told me how much joy it gave Him to see me full of wonder at the gift of life, each time I was pregnant. Each time I celebrate the birthday of one of the children, I find that Christ shows me anew, in prayer, how He delights in my gratitude.
Within the Father's heart, in Heaven, burns a blazing light. This is the glory of the Father, and within it is a furnace of Divine Love. That very love should burn within the heart of every Christian who professes to work for God. If a burning charity is lacking, someone's work cannot succeed. It will be based on human ambition and only human strength.
After Confession, absolution, prayer and penance, I found myself lifted - as the Lord explained - into the 'dance' of the Three Divine Persons, Who showed me Their delight in my trust and obedience, as They shared Their joy with me in prayer.
A person who repents of sin, goes to Confession, receives absolution, prays and offers penance as the Church requests, and who perseveres in love and service, is eventually drawn into the life and prayer of the Holy Trinity, as if spiralling in a heavenly dance of delight, in known and blissful union.
Christ looks with delight at the former-prostitutes who have left behind their old lifestyle and now share with old friends the Good News about the peace and joy to be found in Christ's love and forgiveness.
A person in turmoil is wise if he turns to the Father in Heaven, and believes in his love. If he prays, he will be led to the right Way; and if he follows it, though it takes him through dark times, he will be moving towards the light of Heaven with a new hope in his heart.
Whoever praises God for the grass and the sunlight, the raindrops and the dew, should know that all the beauty of nature has been prepared by God for our delight, and our use. By His deliberate plan, He made a world for us, where we can find life sustained, and our hearts touched by so much loveliness.
The glory of Heaven, which seems to be like a glorious sun, seen from earthly life, stretches upwards into infinite heights, coiled upon itself; and the happy Saints within those vast interiors are astonished by the vistas spread out before them in eternal newness and beauty, with nothing tedious or stale.
As a drug-user suffers when his supply of drugs is withdrawn, and his whole body cries out for its former source of pleasure and well-being, so a soul in Hell suffers - because of his own free choices - when, in Hell, he is suddenly without all those things that make it pleasurable and joyful to be a human being. He is without light, love, joy, peace, beauty, comfort or tenderness - all through his own fault, by his sinful choices.
A mother with a seriously-sick child keeps loving her. She would do nothing to harm her. She would not kill her, however - just as God does not kill the people He loves, even when they have freely chosen to abandon Him, hate Him, and then find themselves in Hell, suffering from the absence of light and love.
Each person on earth is given the choice: whether to serve God or to ignore Him. Those who refuse to live according to God's laws offer a great insult to their Creator; and if they persist in that state until death, it will be as if each is freely choosing to hurl himself away from his Creator, and so away from all love, light and joy.
Christ said to me: 'Beware the Serpent'. He was referring to the evil one who likes to disturb my evening prayers in one disguise or another but who is put to flight by Holy Water and by prayer to the Holy Trinity.
As I praised the Father for the Mother of Christ, who acted to help a couple on their wedding day, I saw Christ reach out and lead His Mother down a little so that she could accept the honour I paid her, and hear my prayers - so great is His delight at seeing His Mother treated with honour and gratitude.
If we want to approach Christ at Adoration, to show out the love that was shown to Him by His Mother Mary on earth, we need only show Him our delight in His Real Presence, our gratitude for His gifts; with joy at being so near Him, and awe at being so close to our God: just as Mary did.
Wherever someone calls out to a Saint in Heaven, to ask for his or her prayers, grace pours down upon the needy as surely as sunlight pours through gaps in a huge cloud.
Although God pours down grace upon us, like sunlight through a great cloud, whenever we ask for the prayers of one of the Saints of Heaven, even greater graces are given to us when we go to the shrine of one of the Saints, and there ask for his or her intercession, at a shrine authorised and blessed by the Church.
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