These are nice and
consoling words which stimulate many people to feel drawn to Jesus
and to follow Jesus. In the beginning of His public life, Jesus
preformed many miracles and many healings. But later Jesus began,
with His example and then with His words, to lead people freely
toward the much more precious gifts, toward true freedom from our
egoism and from our slothfulness. Everyone wants miracles and
healings, but to obtain the more profound and lasting freedom, there
is no other way except toward Jerusalem, toward Calvary with Jesus.
When Jesus began to
explain this true way toward Calvary, even the apostles were amazed
(Mk 10:24) and astonished (Mk 10:26). So many were expecting an
easier life with the coming of the Messiah, but instead Jesus said:
“Think not that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets; I
have come not to abolish them but to fulfil them…” (Mt 5:17). Not
only “you shall not kill … but I say to you that every one who is
angry with his brother shall be liable to judgement.” Not only “You
shall not commit adultery. But I say to you that every one who looks
at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his
heart” (Mt 5:17-37). In the beginning of the sixth chapter of the
Gospel of John, Jesus multiplied the bread and the fish and the
people wanted to make Him king; but at the end of the same chapter
when Jesus declared the necessity to eat His flesh and to drink His
blood, many of His disciples drew back and no longer went about with
Him!
Jesus never accepted
compromises as many people in the Church want to do today. We live in
a world that is further away from God and His 10 Commandments than
ever before in the history of the world. Many religious leaders offer
compromises or approve the excuses of not wanting to follow or to
live the difficult parts of the Gospel, instead of offering a good
holy example, and then offering good words, with much prayer and
self-sacrifice, drawing strong help from the sacraments and from
prayer, above all before the infinite God Who hides in the Eucharist.
“Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin,
it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung round his
neck and he were thrown into the sea” (Mk 9:42). I do not believe
it was by chance that during the period when so many lay people,
priests and bishops rebelled against the Encyclical Letter, Humanae
Vitae (1968), by Pope Paul VI, that Saint Michael the Archangel at
Garabandal (Spain, 1965) said: “Many Cardinal, many Bishops and
many Priests are on the road to perdition and with them they are
bring many souls”!
Jesus is very
demanding but Jesus is able to offer that which the other founders of
other religions are not able to offer: the necessary help to be able
to fully live the Gospel and also the reward of eternal life.
Many people are in
love with the consolations of God but not with the God of
consolations! But without the cross accepted and embraced, there will
not be the crown of glory. There is no resurrection without the
crucifixion; there is no Easter without Good Friday!
Jesus died naked and
humiliated on the cross, as a total failure in the eyes of the world!
How many of us are ready not only to suffer with Jesus but also to
loose our good name, our prestige, our
honor and privileges in the Church and in the civil world before
everyone as did Jesus in order to live and proclaim the uncomfortable
truth which makes us truly free (Jn 8:32)?
- - - - - - -
An Experience of Life:
I have lived thirty
years in the name of drugs, sex and disposable deviance. I was born
without being desired living in an environment marked by difficult
events that unleashed quarrels and misunderstandings. What finally
broke my delicate dreams of a girl was an act
of violence suffered at the age of 12 years. In this way it started
my unstoppable descent into hell beginning with taking drugs so as
not to feel the pain. No one noticed anything.
Apparently
everything was going well, but slowly I was dying loosing the will to
live. I built an impregnable fortress around my heart. Grief and
anger grew in me, so much need of love turned into pride and
presumption. My only companion was heroine. Then cocaine in an
escalation of power and money in real estate. I was ready to do
anything for money and consideration . But at what price? At the
price of using people and then to throw them away when I did not need
them any more. I did not know any limits, but the emptiness inside
was corroding me. I felt more and more terribly alone. Five times I
tried to call it quits, but I did not succeed. Why? I asked myself.
Why had I not yet discovered that Someone had thought about me from
all eternity, and loved me to the point of giving Himself up for me.
I met a reality
involved in street evangelization. I decided to join in the community
where I found a real family who accompanied me step by step in a
rehabilitation program based on the Gospel. From that moment my life
changed: I came to know the infinite love of God through the brothers
and sisters who welcomed me with my cry of pain and loneliness.
Gradually it became all
about the Resurrection, in the experience of joy and forgiveness, in
the ability to freely offer again my existence to those who are still
imprisoned in the death of the soul testifying that Love can do
miracles because God is Love! Jesus descended into my hell and
transfigured it with His immense Love. I want to spend every moment
of my life to be the instrument of the joy of the Resurrection!
Angela Cross, New Horizons
Community
Testimony - Pentecost,
2013, St. Peter's Square
