(
" But Mom, it's so hard to do good all the time ! " )
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Reported
by Bob Schwarz
"Now, hope starts off by knowing that life is going to be difficult. It admits that, without grace, perfection is miles out of reach. It faces the idea of failure. It sees how there are bound to be disappointments and temptations all along the line. But it just goes right on trusting. A person who is strong in this kind of hope looks upon everything that comes along—even mistakes and serious failures—as being a chance not to be missed." ( from the Mystery of Suffering by Hubert van Zeller, 1905 – 1984 , a Benedictine writer and sculptor)
Much of the following text finds it
root in the Bible and should be read as
an itemized list of spiritual directives which have been articulated and
practiced through centuries by men and women , saints as sinners , and all those
with hearts and minds intent on living a
holy life in preparation for heaven .
INTERIOR
STRUGGLE vs. LUKEWARMNESS
"Man's
life upon the earth is warfare." [Job 7:1]
We
can even say that as soon as we pass infancy, the struggle begins.
We
have to enter [ heaven ] through the narrow gate of self-denial and discipline.
Sanctity
means to struggle, and to rise quickly after each defeat.
It
is a war against our selfishness, our pride, against sensuality, laziness,
which we should undertake with renewed vigor, with a real sporting
spirit.
St.
Paul speaks of the Christian’s interior struggle as a race, the greatest sport
for the greatest prize: ….[heaven ]To win in our struggles, we need to
have an over-all strategy, a plan of life.
Planning
means considering things deeply in prayer, asking God for light on how to win
in our interior struggle.
Jesus
said: "For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first
sit down and calculate the outlays that
are necessary (Luke 14:28).
Lord,
help us have a good plan of life, and to follow it more faithfully, reviewing
it frequently, so that we attain our goal.
Lord,
what do you want me to change or improve or uproot in my life?
With
Christ I am crucified (Gal 2:19–20).
Where
should I focus my struggle today? To go to bed on time at night, get up on
time in the morning? To write down a schedule ? To be more cheerful at home?
Am I
diligent in the little skirmishes of each day?
Diligence
and vigilance mean readiness to struggle at all times, even when we feel at a
disadvantage, tired, did not sleep well...
To
struggle means getting back up; to rise again, quickly, after every fall; with
supernatural stubbornness, learning from past failures, aware that God is
helping us. We cannot take it easy. Our Lord wants us to fight more, on a
broader front, more intensely each day.
We have an obligation to outdo ourselves, for in this competition the only goal
is to arrive at the glory of Heaven. And if we did not reach Heaven, the whole
thing would have been useless .
But
just as resistance and tension in exercise make the muscles stronger and
bigger, the difficulties we encounter can strengthen our will if we don’t give
up .
Lord,
just as You carried your Cross up to Calvary, giving up to the last drop of your
Blood for our redemption, we too will persevere.
What
happens if I don't struggle, if I don’t assert my freedom to be better?If I
just surrender to my love of comfort? Then I will become lukewarm, mediocre,
and therefore unhappy.[ Lukewarmess ] implies hesitation or negligence to
correspond to divine love, a refusal to give oneself over to the prompting of
charity . "I know your deeds; I know you were neither hot nor cold.
How I wish you were one or the other — hot or cold! But because you are lukewarm,
neither hot or cold, I will spew you out of my mouth! "(Rev 3:15-16).
Blessed Alvaro del Portillo, in one of his
Letters, wrote: "Lukewarmness ...
means that the will is seriously ill. The will of the lukewarm person has its
capacity to see goodness blurred, while it is on the lookout for anything that
flatters its own ego. In such a state, it accumulates in the soul the dregs and
rottenness of selfishness and pride. As these settle, they give a progressively
carnal taste to all that person's behavior. If this evil is not stopped in its
tracks, the most abject desires, tainted by those festering sediments of
lukewarmness, take shape and grow progressively stronger. The desire for
compensations arises; irritability, when faced with the slightest demand of
sacrifice… conversation becoming empty or self-centered, Charity grows cold and
the apostolic zeal which enables one to talk about God with real conviction is
lost ."
What
is the cure [ of lukewarmness ] ? To fall in love again . St. Teresa of
Avila says: "It is not a matter of thinking much, but of loving much; do,
then, whatever most arouses you to love. … Love consists, not in what most
pleases us, but in the strength of our determination to desire to please God in
everything and to endeavor to do everything we can not to offend him. "
Wrote Blessed Alvaro, "Don't forget... that Christian life has to be necessarily manifested in a determined daily struggle to overcome sin and to give space for the love of God ."
Coming Nov. 1:
A Touch of an Angel
In a Store's Garden Section
Inspire
by a Spanish Canary
And
a Family of Ducks
The END
comments welcome at
rrschwarz7@wowway.com
©
2020 Robert R. Schwarz
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