predication.net

Have you ever felt like you were confessing the same sins over and over again?  Did you think, disgusted, because it looks like you’re still struggling with the exact sin mechanism that you’ve gotten bitterly out of? If this is the case, look at God’s relationship with Israel during the period of the judges. God’s people had great difficulty in being faithful to them. Even when God raised judges for them who led them and delivered them from their enemies, they kept returning to the same ways of behavior that, above all, separated them from God. Surrounded by temptation, they lost sight of him. But God did not give them up.O. O.he again sent them judges who protected and guided them, saved them from the consequences of bad decisions when they left the ways of the Lord. God, moved by mercy, sent them a new judge again and again. These judges were the forerunners of Jesus. However, none of them was perfect.

Each of them had its shortcomings, which could make it difficult for God’s people to access the salvation that God offered them fully. Remember Samson, who fell through Dalila’s seduction and lost his strength. Remember the rash promise of Jephthah that led to the death of his daughter. Neither of the judges was the perfect answer. Each of them struggled with some sin or weakness or failure – just like us. When you feel like a hopeless case, tangled in your struggles, take a moment to remember who Jesus is and what He has done for you. He is the perfect Savior and Judge, and he has not given up on you. Even if you don’t see it, he is still with you and offers you his strength and comfort. And when Christ is with you, you can be sure that you are making progress, even if it doesn’t look like it. So don’t hesitate to go to confession. God’s mercy will not fail. He won’t give up on you! Jesus, your perfect redeemer and liberator, is waiting for you, ready to take away the burden of guilt from you and give you more strength to turn away from sin.

I was talking about death the other day. I mentioned what infidels say. They argue that death is to turn into nothing. We were, we will run out of smoke, steam; death is the end of everything. This is what living people say in mortal sin, because they fear and tremble before the judgment of the righteous God, they would like it if death were the end of everything, that’s why they do so, like a child in the dark, they whistle, they sing to conceal their fear. He who lives like an animal does not ask to live even after death. And yet he will live forever, but his eternal life will be an eternal torment! Therefore, it is better to believe that a believer’s heart is a soul than to cast our soul into damnation by unreasonable denial. Every person with common sense believes that he is a soul. Although we cannot see it with our physical eyes, faith teaches us about it, and experience testifies.

There was a famous professor in Budapest. He once dissected a human corpse. In doing so, he spoke to his medical students who were standing by: “You see, I have already dissected several thousand corpses, but my scalpel has not yet found a soul. Look here, now I will cut this body into individual organs and parts, show me where the soul is until I see it, I do not believe. “

Well, let this wise professor of medicine show me his mind until he shows it to me; I don’t believe he has a mind! However, he is right about one thing, namely that there is no soul in a corpse.

We know so much that when a person is conceived in the life of a mother, at that moment God creates a soul for him in his body, and that soul remains in that body until that person dies. When a man dies, his soul comes out of his body; but as the soul comes into the body and as it comes out of it, there is no wise man who can explain it, only God himself knows that. It lies that she is in the body; we see, we experience, because a person lives, moves, talks, cries, laughs, thinks, does, but only as long as his soul is in the body.

The soul is a spirit; we do not see it like the sun; we cannot hear it like the voice of a bell; we cannot smell it like a flower; we cannot catch it like a piece of wood, but we feel it in ourselves, because she loves or hates, rejoices or grieves, moved by her we walk or stand, she speaks and thinks in us.

St. Augustine had a friend named Genadius, a particular doctor. He was a proper, brave, and zealous doctor who treated the poor for free and carefully cared for the sick. His only mistake was doubting whether he had a soul. For his many good deeds, the Lord God granted him the grace to send an angel to him in a dream. Angel started talking to him:

“Genadius, can you see me? – Yes, I see you. – Do you see me with your eyes? – No, because now I’m sleeping. – So how do you see me? – I don’t know. – Do you hear what am I’m saying? – I hear. – Well, do you hear my voice with your ears? – No. – Are you speaking now? – Yes. – You are speaking with your mouth? – No. — Well, behold, you are sleeping now, after all, you see, hear, and speak. So do you already believe that you have a soul? “The doctor woke up and no longer doubted that he was a soul.

Surely man is a strange creature of God; he is in the world like a stone; he grows like a tree; he feels like an animal; he has reason like an angel, and he has a soul like God. As scholars make a sphere similar to our Earth from paper and draw countries on this paper so that we can see the whole world with one look, so also the Lord God, when he created our soul, he drew his image on our soul in a small way, in the soul of a person we can see a strange parable of God himself, because the soul is a spirit similar to God, it lives forever similarly to God, he has reason and free will similarly to God. This is what the words of the Scriptures say: “Then God said: ‘Let us make man in our image and according to our likeness! And God created man in his image. “(Gn 1,26 27). The soul of man has become like the Father in its memory, the Son in its reason, and the Holy Spirit in its will.

The soul lives forever, the Savior Jesus Christ predicted to his disciples that suffering awaits them, martyrdom, but he also encouraged them: “Do not be afraid of those; they kill the body, but they cannot kill the soul. Rather, fear the one who can destroy both soul and body in hell. “(Mt 10,28). After all, if there were no soul, a person would be cursed worse than the last worm. At least the worm does not feel; it does not understand that it is the last one. A lie for a person is the doubled misery of this life, because he feels and thinks; he feels that the criminals are humiliating him, he sees that he is doing well with a bastard, but he has nothing to put in his mouth. But he hopes he will suffer. Life is short, but the soul is eternal. God repays according to merit.

A better example is the parable of poor Lazarus. Lazarus was a beggar, sleeping in the open air overnight. An ugly illness plagued him; everyone turned away from him, and only the dogs licked his wounds. And this Lazarus died, his troubles came to an end, and angels escorted his soul to Heaven.

The soul has reason, knows the things present, and examines the future. He knows where the world comes from, what God created it for. He believes in God with his soul, longs for Him with his heart, and prays to Him. That is why God gave reason to our souls so that we could understand the preciousness of the soul. Let us consider that the only begotten Son of God, Jesus Christ, not man, not angel, sent us as a redeemer, but He gave Himself for our redemption. The soul has free will. God presents his commands to us, but does not force us to keep them; he leaves it to us, and we decide to do so. God does not do with us like that, stupid Father who had an iron cage made for his mischievous child, locked him in it, gave him food and drink to meet him, it didn’t make you angry. A person with complete freedom does as they please. If they perform well, they will receive retribution; if they perform poorly, they will be fined.

“Before man lies life and death, good and evil: he gets what he likes. “(Sir 15,18). True, the path of sin is easy and wide; it leads to Hell. The path of virtue is difficult and narrow, but it leads to Heaven.

To Sts. Once, two more critical men came to Makário. They begged him to teach them such wisdom that they would benefit from it until death. St. Macarius poured the water into one container and invited those guests to look into it. What do you see in it? – asked them. We see our face reflected in that water. Then St. Macarius threw a piece of mud into the water, confused it, and asked again what they saw in it now. Nothing, – answered him. You speak well. Behold, here is the wisdom of life. If you keep your soul clean from the mud of sins, you will have an image of God himself in it. So live that this dear holy image never fails: that will be your true wisdom.

Saint Jane Frances de Chantal was born on January 28, 1572, in the French city of Dijon to noble and virtuous parents. Her father was Benignus Frémyot, president of the Parliament of Burgundy, and her mother was Marguerite de Berbisey.

Her devout mother died early, leaving three children in her father’s care: Jane, who received the name Frances at confirmation, Marguerite, and Andrew. At the death of her beloved mother, the frail, pious Jane commended herself to the care of the Virgin Mary, sighing: “You be my Mother, since God has called my mother from this earth to Himself!”

Her caring father thus raised his children himself, especially in the holy religion. And Jane repaid him with her piety, innocence, and helpfulness. Even as a child, she was zealous for the holy religion and shamed many a heretic. At that time, the erroneous teaching of John Calvin, who, among other things, denied the presence of Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, infected many lukewarm Christians. Jane was only twelve years old when her father was visited one day by a nobleman who spoke with him about faith and denied the Savior’s presence in the Blessed Sacrament. Johanna was then in the room with her governess and the other children. She ran to the heretic and exclaimed: “Sir, you must believe that Jesus Christ is present in the Blessed Sacrament, because He said so! If you do not believe it, you consider Him a liar.”

Saint Francis de Sales and Saint Jane Frances de Chantal give their hearts to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

The stranger was astonished by the child’s words and asked Jane more questions, to which she answered decisively and openly. To appease her, he poured candies into her apron. But she ran to the fireplace, dumped all the candies into the fire, and said gravely: “Look, sir, this is how heretics will burn in hell, because they do not believe what the Lord Christ said. If you had said that the king was a liar, my father, as president of the parliament, would have condemned you to death. Since you said that the Savior lied, those two presiding here will condemn you to death!” And she pointed to a painting of the holy apostles Peter and Paul. This event shows us the exceptionally pious nature of Saint Jane even in her youthful age.

In 1592, her father called her to Dijon. As soon as she arrived home, the twenty-year-old Jane had many noble suitors. However, she submitted to her father’s will as to whom he would choose for her as a husband, and he decided on the exemplary Catholic, Baron de Chantal. The saintly maiden prepared for this serious step with prayer, good deeds, and frequent reception of the holy sacraments.

When she married, she excelled in all the virtues of a Christian wife at her castle in Bourbille. Her noble husband entrusted her with the entire household, as he, as a statesman, had to travel very often. Her first concern was that everyone living in the castle should serve God. She kept only devout servants, with whom she prayed. Those who went to work in the fields first attended Holy Mass. On Sundays and holidays, all servants had to go to the parish church, and she taught them holy religion at home. She rose early in the morning and worked tirelessly in the household until evening. She was so thrifty that soon her husband’s property, previously low due to lack of supervision, grew again, and all debts were paid. When her husband was not home, she put away all her ornaments and dressed very simply.

One Sunday, as she was preparing to go to the parish church with her servants and maids, as was her custom, her husband told her that Holy Mass in the castle chapel was just as good as in the parish church, which was three hours away. The devout baroness replied: “There are graces associated with gathering in the church. And nothing is as convincing as example. How can the poor people believe what is proclaimed to them about their duties to God, when we ourselves neglect these duties and do not seek glory in serving such a great and good Lord.”With her savings, she gave generous alms to the poor. As a result of the war, there was great poverty. Saint Jane distributed generous alms, although she herself suffered poverty. The poor came daily through one gate into the castle and left through the other,”so there would be no mess. That’s how she wanted it. However, it often happened that many poor people received alms two or three times, which she herself distributed in the courtyard. When her household pointed this out to her, she said: “It is your duty to tell me this; but it is my duty to give alms to these poor people as many times as they ask me for it.” And she sighed: “My God, I beg incessantly at the door of Your mercy; would I wish that my pleas would not be heard the second and third time? You have suffered my importunity a thousand times, why should I not suffer it from Your creatures?”

She loved her husband with tender affection and tried in every way to sweeten his life with innocent joy, often even shortening her devotions to shorten his time in their solitude with her cheerful disposition. When he was ill, she nursed him carefully and persistently herself. She lived in a happy marriage for eight years when God visited her to lead her to higher perfection through suffering. One day, her husband went hunting with his relative and friend. He positioned himself in a thicket. Meanwhile, his cousin pursued a deer from the other side. When he came to the thicket, something moved. He thought it was the deer and fired… Baron de Chantal lay in his blood.

The gravely wounded Baron exclaimed: “I am dying. My friend, I forgive you, for this misfortune happened due to carelessness.” He immediately sent four servants to various parishes for a priest to come to him as soon as possible and administer the last rites to the dying man. He sent a fifth servant to his wife with the words: “Do not tell her that I am mortally wounded, but only that I have been shot.” The servant informed the Baroness as his master had instructed him. The saint sighed: “Oh, they want to gild this bitter pill for me!” And she immediately ran to the scene of the accident.

When her wounded husband saw her, he said: “My friend, God’s judgment is just.” After he confessed and comforted his cousin who had shot him, the poor wife’s grief was so great that she cried out to heaven: “Lord, take everything I have on earth: relatives, possessions, and children, just leave me this good husband whom You have granted me!” But all was in vain. Her beloved virtuous husband died nine days later, and St. Jane remained a widow. She mourned his premature death with her three daughters and one son.

The twenty-eight-year-old widow bore her bitter fate with resignation to God’s will and repeated the words: “God does everything in His mercy!” And she gave away her festive clothes, dressed in mourning, and wanted to wear them until her death. She decided to dedicate herself entirely to God’s service. She devoted her time to raising her children, household chores, the poor, and the sick.

At her father-in-law’s request, she moved with her children to live with him in Mouthelon. She lived there for seven and a half years, and during this period, she had to endure the slights and extravagance of a proud girl who had completely captivated her elderly father-in-law, Baron de Chantal. The holy widow patiently endured everything and overcame it through work and prayer. She often prayed for God to send her a guide who would lead her on the path to perfection. And merciful God heard her fervent plea.

Today, on the day of remembrance of Saint Clare of Assisi (1194-1253), we listen to an excerpt from the Gospel of John in connection with the Last Supper, when Jesus says goodbye to his loved ones who are about to leave, it points to a new way to cling to it. He physically leaves, but we can stay with him mystically and sacramentally. In such a short snippet, we are amazed by the recurring expression. It is not a matter of maintaining communion, but of maintaining directly the deep intimacy of mutual life with Jesus, as happens, after all, with the guilty tribe and branches. Pope Francis commented on the same excerpt: „Jesus is a vine and through it – similar to the sap of a tree – God’s love itself, the Holy Spirit, passes to the branches“.

We accept the fullness of the Holy Spirit when we „we are in net“ or „we remain in net“. This is a concentrated summary of the life of St. Clare: God, expressed by the combination of branches and vines, describes Clare in his fourth letter to St. Agnes of Bohemia, where he explains, as she herself experiences this connection: „His affection moves, His contemplation encourages, His generosity fulfills, His sweetness complements, His memory pleasantly enlightens, His fragrance will revive the dead, and His presence blesses all the inhabitants of the heavenly Jerusalem“. The Gospel suggests an ascent to the very heart of life in God: „Remaining begins by being a community, a presence, an inferiority; then it becomes a movement of love, agape, a saturation; and it ends with the shared fruits of this rarity: they belong to the vine, but they manifest, grow and ripen in the branches. Everything points to perseverance in this fire of life: „Now stay“ (Jan 15.9) in my love.

During these weeks, many of us are traveling by car, on vacation. With the growing number of means of transport, we feel more and more clearly that those who want to reach their destination with certainty need above all vigilance, alertness and the ability to react quickly. Without this, they endanger themselves and others. Vigilance is the key word that we encounter today in the readings of Holy Scripture. The comparison with driving a car is not at all misguided, as it may seem at first glance: those who are not vigilant in faith and react out of excessive interest easily lose sight of the situation and risk various losses. Each of today’s three readings mentions a completely different aspect of vigilance. Those who are vigilant live something more than just this moment. The text from the Book of Wisdom clarifies this statement: vigilance recognizes a greater scope of expectation and counts on the improbable, the extraordinary, and surprises from God. By remembering God’s history with Israel, the Jewish minority gains courage. God’s faithfulness has long been the basis of His promise (the exodus from Egypt), and so God’s people can take God seriously and build on their faithfulness to Him. His people are able to endure difficult life situations, they are able to stay awake, to pay attention to God’s signs even in suffering, because they know that God will never break His promise and will not take the election of His people for granted.

He who is vigilant has the courage to make a change! This fundamental characteristic of vigilance is clear in the life of Abraham, which the second reading tells us about. When a person hears God’s call, vigilance leads him to the courage to make a change, to set out – even if it is risky – into new situations in life. In Abraham’s journey, we can see that believing on the path of promise means that one must overcome, pass decisive tests of proof, by taking God’s word seriously and letting himself be guided by it. For Abraham, this means giving up his life’s security and setting out for a land unknown to him. It means trusting in God’s power to give life and the promise of abundant offspring. It means trusting in the hardest, humanly seemingly meaningless task, giving up his own son. It is always a future that cannot be estimated, and whose risk can only be overcome with the certainty that it is God himself who comes to meet man – and this is precisely in hopeless situations, when there is nothing left to count on, when everything seems to be lost. This is faith: “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1)

Watchful Essen develops a feeling for the things of God, for people, for behavior in certain life situations. For every believer, basic attitudes such as freedom from material possessions, vigilance regarding the future coming of the Lord, and faithfulness in dealing with God’s goods and the people God has entrusted to us are essential. These basic attitudes are not abstract principles, but become carriers of life when encountering quite concrete people and events. The Gospel makes it clear that inattention and lack of sensitivity have negative consequences for both our relationship with the world and our relationship with God. Vigilance and openness to God and people, on the other hand, create a lasting and indestructible community. Waiting on the Lord becomes concrete only in a helpful, loving treatment of all creation. Vigilance is therefore an attitude of life that helps me to be attentive and vigilant in my life. When I am alert and attentive, I perceive the chances and possibilities that my life offers me. However, if I focus only on guarding my treasures, it can happen that I overlook the chances that offer me to change my life. However, when I am open to what comes in my life, I can accept it, even if it seems at first to be something incomprehensible, unacceptable and too demanding, which in the end can contribute to growth and great profit.

1

On August 9, 1942, philosopher Edita Stein perished in the Nazi extermination camp Auschwitz II – Birkenau. She came from a Jewish family, was baptized as an adult, and after entering the Carmelite order, she took the name Therese Benedict of the Cross. In 1998 she was canonized and proclaimed co-patron of Europe. The Church celebrates her feast day on August 9.Man is called to live in his innermost self and to gain mastery over himself in a way that is only possible from here; and only from this center of his being is he also able to deal correctly with the world, only from here can he find the place in it that is destined for him. Yet he never fully sees his innermost self. It remains a mystery to him that only God can reveal to him – to the extent that he pleases. And yet man has his innermost self in his own hands: he can dispose of it in perfect freedom, but he also has the duty to protect it as a precious treasure entrusted to him. In the realm of the spirit, this treasure must have immense value: angels have been ordered to guard it; evil spirits try to seize it; and God himself has chosen it as his dwelling. Neither good nor evil spirits, however, have free access to the deepest depths of the soul.he right to decide for itself belongs to the soul. The fact that God also respects this right is the great mystery of personal freedom. God wishes to rule over created spirits only on the basis of the free gift of their love. He knows the thoughts of the heart. His gaze penetrates the furthest abysses and depths of the soul, the bottom of which the soul itself will never see unless he illuminates them for it. However, God does not want to seize possession of it unless it itself wants to do so. And yet God does everything so that the soul freely surrenders its will to him as a gift of his love and allows itself to be led by him to a blessed union.

God is love. Therefore, if God captivates the soul, it means that the soul burns with love, if its spirit is ready for it. For everything that is finite, eternal love is a consuming fire. And all the movements that awaken created things in the soul are finite. If the soul surrenders itself to created things, it will betray this love of God, but it will never completely escape it. God’s love will then become a consuming fire for itself.

In Christ, thanks to his nature and his free choice, there was nothing that was contrary to love. He lived every moment of his life in unreserved surrender to the love of God. However, by becoming man, he took upon himself the whole weight of the sins of humanity, seized them with his merciful love and hid them in his soul: in the Ecce venio (Behold, I come…), with which he began his earthly life and which he explicitly renewed in his baptism, and in his Fiat (Become…) in Gethsemane. Thus was fulfilled the fire of reconciliation that had been burning within him throughout all the sufferings of his life, but which, however, flared up like an unstoppable conflagration in the Garden of Olives and on the Cross, because there the Father took away from him the tangible bliss of indissoluble union in order to give him over entirely to the last and most painful test: the experience of ultimate abandonment by God. The words It is finished… announce that this fire of reconciliation has burned out, and the phrase Father, into your hands I commend my spirit… proclaim the definitive return to eternal, untarnished union in love.

In the suffering and death of Christ, our sins were consumed by fire. If we accept this by faith and if we accept the whole of Christ in the surrender of this faith – which means, however, that we choose the path of following Christ and also follow it – then he himself will lead us “through his suffering and death to the glory of the resurrection”. This is what we experience in contemplation: through the heat of the conciliatory fire we pass to the blissful union in love. This also explains the ambiguous character of contemplation, which is at once death and resurrection. After the dark night, the living flame of love shines.

Today, we celebrate the memory of Saint Dominic, who was one of those who brought people to Christ with his life and proclamation. He was born in 1170 in Spain and devoted his whole life to serving God and spreading the faith. Dominic founded the Order of Friars of Preachers, known as the Dominicans.

At that time, a delusional Albigensian sect was spreading in southern France. Dominic was sent to them and to other heretics to bring them to conversion. Together with his spiritual sons, he was involved in missionary work and traveled throughout Europe to spread the gospel and strengthen the faith of believers. His passionate devotion to God and truth, his passion to proclaim the gospel, brought a new spiritual fire to the Church. Dominic was known for his wisdom, humility, and love for his neighbors. His life story is full of examples of sacrifice and service.

Saint Dominic died in 1221 in Bologna. With his courage, love, and faithfulness to God, he still inspires many believers today to a deeper spiritual life and service to their neighbors. We can learn endurance from him so that we do not give up the struggle with the delusions of our time.