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Unless a seminarian becomes a man of prayer, with a deep love for Christ, a belief in the Spirit's power, and the Father's providential care, he will not be a good priest, nor will he be able to persevere in the Priesthood.

A charitable person teaches children how to behave in God's house and how to pray; and she therefore helps them to find inner peace in the Presence of their Saviour. It is not charitable to let a child run riot and disturb other people, in a place specially consecrated for Christian prayer.

It is the Catholic Church which keeps asunder the cloud of ignorance and hopelessness which once covered the world. In every age, despite the sins of her members, she does what Jesus did in His earthly life. By His Spirit's guidance and power, she teaches truth, forgives, heals, prays, offers the Holy Sacrifice, helps the poor, and makes people holy.

In the spiritual life, it can seem as though we travel on a narrow path, between high walls, with little hope of finding joy. But just where the path seems most unpromising, it can open out - if we persevere - into an orchard, full of trees laden with fruit and lush foliage. Helped by the prayers of the Saints, our state of life is becoming fruitful.

By ourselves, we cannot penetrate the bright cloud which is the Godhead. But God reaches out to some of us with a firm invitation to enter - in a sudden conversion - or reaches out at the very instant that someone calls out for His help. Unless we enter His life we shall, in the end, fall into the void.

There are a thousand ways in which the enemies of Christ try to draw us away from prayer, or from His service. Horrible images can be driven away by the use of Holy water and prayer, and the sign of the cross.

Our guardian Angels always pray with immense reverence and devotion. They love to see us pray in the same manner; and though we do not usually see them we can delight in the knowledge that they are beside us as we pray: our faithful guardians and companions.

Christ said that many Catholics who should pray every day cannot be bothered to do so: cannot be bothered to turn in regular conversation to the one Who created them, died to save them, sustains them in being, and will one day judge them.

Catholics, more than other people, have so many opportunities for prayer, yet many cannot be bothered to praise Christ for Creation, or for His Incarnation, or for His Church, or when receiving Him in Holy Communion, or when near the tabernacle, or during each day as He sustains our lives, or at death when we shall meet Him and find out what we have done with our lives and whether we are ready for Heaven.

The Father listens eagerly to our prayers for help for ourselves and for other people. It is as if the Father wanted us to make many more requests so that He could have the pleasure of granting them.

Mary, the Immaculate Virgin Mother of Christ, has a purity which is extraordinary; and we, who are not so pure, need to do penance for our sins, as well as to pray for help and forgiveness.

The Lord asked me to look at all the people who were standing beside the balustrade at Lourdes, watching the Rosary Procession. He said: A great deal more prayer and penance would rise up to Heaven from this place if they all joined in, instead of just watching.

The nuns who have offered their whole lives to God in contemplation and penance effect powerful changes in the lives of sinners. The penances of ordinary people, too, are effective, pouring into the world, by God's grace, a stream of living water rather than the 'puss' which oozes from sinful deeds and conversations.

A sinful soul, damaged by a seriously sinful way of life, is like a bombed-out shop in a war-zone. Rubbish is strewn all over the street, from the blast: and no trading can take place until the premises have been cleaned, mended, painted, furnished and re-stocked. As kind people can make a place habitable, so the prayers of our Blessed Lady are powerfully effective in restoring souls to their earlier beauty.

Lourdes is not just an example of care of the sick. In looking at the Domaine in Lourdes, we have a picture of the Church which is in the world but not of it. We have a place for the sacraments, and for Reconciliation, a place for Adoration of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, a place for devotion to Mary, a place where contemplatives pray for Church members - and much mutual help between pilgrims during our pilgrimage, including care of strangers.

The Lord illustrated for me the result of prayer. When I prayed for a troubled soul, the Lord showed me that He was sitting between me and that person, with His arm round each of us. The troubled person had been brought closer to Christ by my intercessionary prayer; and I had been drawn closer to Christ through my act of charity.

Our Lady spoke about those people who deliberately ignore her prayers, and the good advice of other people, and who deliberately take the path that leads to Hell. If they do not repent before the 'door' of death closes, they will be trapped in torment forever.

As God looks upon the world, He sees how few of us believe in His goodness, how few of us expect answers to prayer, how few of us have prayed with faith in the merits of His Son Jesus, Who died for us. Our faith has not developed because we have not really given our whole lives to God, in regular prayer and works of charity.

St. Catherine of Sienna, who lived in a street I once saw, believed in the Father's goodness. She obeyed Him. She prayed with faith, and was answered like the Apostles in earlier times; she put her trust in God even when He led her through suffering in the course of her particular vocation; yet her reward was Heaven.

The sick have great work to do for God! Christ asked me to speak the truth to the other sick and handicapped people I meet: I should say that we are all called to be Saints. We can accept our unavoidable sufferings and offer them up in union with Christ on the Cross, and pray with Him for sinners to repent and find forgiveness and peace.