Living the Divine Will (2)

Another insightful teaching which one finds in the Book of Heaven, written by the servant of God Louisa Piccarreta, is about Christian hope.

Pope Francis himself has some interesting reflections on hope. He said: “Dear young people, do not be afraid of making decisive choices in life. Have faith; the Lord will not abandon you!” “From my point of view, God is the light that illuminates the darkness, even if it does not dissolve it, and a spark of divine light is within each of us.” “Although the life of a person is in a land full of thorns and weeds, there is always a space in which the good seed can grow. You have to trust God.” “Let us pray for peace: peace in the world and in each of our hearts.”

“God’s love calls us to move beyond fear. We ask God for the courage to put on faith, hope and love as we go out into the world and become the word in body as well as spirit.”

Louisa offers you and me this interesting pericope on hope from the first volume of The Book of Heaven:

Now, while Jesus would speak about Hope, He would withdraw for a little, leaving a light in my intellect. Who can tell what I comprehended about Hope? If all the other virtues serve to embellish the soul, but can make us stagger and render us inconstant – Hope, instead, renders the soul firm and stable, like those high mountains which cannot be moved a tiny bit. It seems to me that it happens to the soul invested with Hope as to certain very high mountains: all of the intemperances of the air cannot do any harm to these mountains; neither snow, nor winds, nor heat can penetrate into them; whatever thing might be placed at their top, one can be sure of finding there where it was put, even if a hundred years should pass. Just so is the soul clothed with Hope: nothing can do harm to her, neither tribulation, nor poverty; nor do all the various accidents of life dismay her for one instant. She says to herself: “I can do everything, I can bear everything, suffer everything – hoping in Jesus, who forms the object of all my hopes.” Hope renders the soul almost omnipotent, invincible, and it administers to her the final perseverance, so much so, that only then does she cease to hope and to persevere, when she has taken possession of the Kingdom of Heaven. Then, she lays down Hope and plunges all of herself into the immense ocean of Divine Love.

It was this firm and unconquerable hope which led St Paul, our faith in faith, to exclaim in his letter to the Philippians: I can do all things in him who strengthens me (Phil 4:13).

Lord make my soul firm, stable, perseverant, by instilling in me the virtue of hope till my last breath on earth. Amen.  

 

Fr Mario Attard OFM Cap