'Taken out' by the enemy

A friend of mine has a great-grandson now, a splendid little chap, and I noticed how bright his eyes are. Not only because they are brand new; but it’s as if the light shines from within out into the world; this is seen in the newly Baptised.

Similarly it is seen in the passion and idealism of youth. Often though the promise of youth gives way to the mediocrity of middle-age, compromises made, troubles mount up, and overwhelmed by the cares of this world we can easily be ‘taken out’ by the enemy of our souls with his menu of false gods and quick fixes. So many men fall into alcoholism, pornography, adultery, gambling, etc. and it’s a growing trend.

There are many reasons for this but what is central I think is forgetfulness. In our age particularly we have forgotten that we have an enemy and that the devil is devoted 24/7 to our eternal destruction by whatever means he can use. By ourselves alone we are quite powerless against such a being. We also forget that we were never designed to live independently from God.

We cannot live independently anymore than a baby in the womb can without its mother providing all the nutrients it needs to grow and arrive safely into the world. Our Prayer life is rather like an umbilical cord connecting us with God. Our time on earth might be likened to gestation in the womb, growing as we are fed. At death we are delivered into heaven.

We really need to get back to prayer, so we can be open to God’s grace which is sufficient for the days’ troubles. Our reliance on God and growing relationship with Him, only achievable through daily prayer, is the only thing that can keep the enemy of our souls at bay and enable us to triumph.

Suffering Behind Every Door

 We visited some friends in a town where a recent typhoon gave rise to extensive landslides on the mountain roads and many deaths as a result. The biggest loss was when 30+ people ran into a 5 story concrete government building, ironically for safety, and the whole mountainside slid off, destroying the structure and bringing it down on top of them. The townsfolk were in shock and many in mourning. 

Where nature’s fury had done its worst, the gentle hand of God was there in its wake. Only a few days had passed and most of the townsfolk were involved in helping to find the dead and cleaning up the town. The men dug, the women brought them food and water. There were Novena prayers in the homes of the dead in the evenings attended by many; and there was no recrimination; there was worship and praise, thanksgiving and prayers for mercy for their loved ones. As they pulled together in necessity, the mercy of God soothed the weariness of their hearts. 

It is a praying community, used to clinging to God in good times and bad and this is their anchor and strength. 

It was quite a privilege to be present to witness this.

Healer of Souls

This week the relic of the Incorrupt heart of St (Padre) Pio was at Manila Cathedral on its way around the country.  Crowds, too numerous to count braved the weather in long queues to venerate the relic.

He is very much loved; a saint for our times as he was such a contradiction to the ways of the world.  It seems that his incredible gift of being able to read souls was matched only by his capacity to suffer; with both the stigmata and enduring the constant attacks of the devil. Perhaps that was the price of such a gift in that he had to suffer in order to set his penitents free from bondage, to obtain for them the gift of conversion.

One wonderful story, told by a lady who confessed to him, was about a hidden sin she had. She went to confession to him and after she had finished he asked if she had anything else she wanted to tell. She said ‘no’ and he asked her to return the next day. She confessed other sins and was asked if there was anything else ; again she responded ‘no’ and was asked to return the next day. On the last day, he mentioned the date and time when she had an abortion, and then he told her what her aborted son would have been had he lived, the destiny that was lost when his life had been extinguished. That revelation showed her the gravity of the sin and she was repentant and reconciled with God.

St. Pio reveals to us the gentleness and mercy of a God so much offended but always willing to forgive at the slightest opening of a repentant heart.

The wonderful thing about our saints though is that their mission does not end in death, it is ramped up a notch; the miracles abound all the more when they are born into heaven.

The Wall

Occasionally, stories from the Underground Catholic Church in China make it through the bamboo curtain to give us a glimpse of their valour and devotion. One I heard years ago was about a missionary who visited China and stayed with a Catholic family in a rural area. In the middle of night, he heard everyone moving around and asked what was going on. “We are going to the Wall” they answered and he accompanied them as they crept out of the house and made off across the fields to a clearing in a forest.

Many other people had gathered there, coming from all directions, some climbed trees and kept watch in case anyone had been followed by the authorities. One person then approached an old wall (perhaps part of a derelict building) and removed a brick to reveal the Blessed Sacrament.

All knelt in silent adoration for a holy hour, replaced the brick and went home.

No one knows just how much they have suffered at the hands of the atheist Communist government over the last few decades; persecutions are varied, from economic sanctions like fines and loss of work, to harassment by Police and neighbours or torture, imprisonment and martyrdom. The regime has been quite consistent in its desire to control every aspect of the lives of its people and to single out the menace of religion for particularly brutal attention.

When Neville Chamberlain attempted to avoid conflict by signing the Munich agreement with Hitler, I imagine he was sincere, if a little naive as the full horror of Nazism had not yet been revealed but the recent agreement between the Vatican and the Chinese Government over the apointment of bishops is quite incomprehensible: their character is already known.

The faithfulness of the Underground church is an incredible witness to the rest of the Catholic world; let’s hope and pray that the church they love can prove worthy of their sacrifices for it and stand with them now.

Return to Holiness

After the assassination of Martin Luther King, at a meeting while the people were still in shock, a chap gave a speech where he first stated that ‘our leader is not dead’ and then that ‘Martin Luther King was not the leader of the civil rights movement’. The crowd groaned thinking it would become a leadership struggle amongst opportunists and the whole thing would fall apart.

Then he went on to say ‘Our leader is the one who parted the Red Sea, who led the people out of slavery, who was born in a stable, who was crucified, died and rose from the dead.’ He is our leader.

In times of crisis, as our church is now facing a global flood of sex scandals and abuse cases and a revelation of the growing extent of homosexual paedophile predators within our church and seminaries which is utterly bewildering to the faithful; we need to focus on the one who is in overall control, rather than those whose past negligence, complacency and evil deeds have brought the church to this point.

Our prayers are needed to purge the church of this great evil that has taken root and even become a dominant subculture in some places. Anyone who has had an enema knows it is an unpleasant necessity.

Whilst the obscene actions of so many must fill us with disgust I believe the Lord is relentless in bringing about the transformation of His church, ‘to be without spot or stain’ and so will continue to send His church messengers to lift the lid on what is inside, until there is a change of heart and a return to holiness.

We can remain confident that whatever enemies the church has (even within its ranks) that ‘the gates of the underworld will never hold out against it’.

Walking forward in faith...a story from Mexico

In 1964 Fr Rich Thomas was appointed to El Paso in Texas. Around 1969/1970 he was profoundly touched by God and started charismatic prayer meetings in the parish. During one prayer meeting in 1972 they read the passage in Luke 14:12-14 which says, When you give a lunch or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relations or rich neighbours, in case they invite you back and so repay you.

Now when you have a party, invite the poor for they have no means to repay you and so you will be repaid when the upright rise again. The prayer meeting decided that on Christmas day that year, 1972, they would give a Christmas lunch to the poor who lived and worked in the dump in Juarez, which was just across the border in Mexico. The poor people in the dump used to separate the rubbish into various types, cans, bottles, cardboard etc and then sell it to a co-op which would in turn sell it on. They lived in the dump and worked 7 days a week for $5. 

The prayer group had prepared food for 125 people on Christmas Day. When they got to the dump Fr Rich and the group discovered that they had two labour unions . One union could not go into the others area. Eventually Fr Rich got them to come to one area for the food. Three hundred and fifty people turned up so Fr Rich explained that there was not enough food for everyone but they would share what they had. All 350 had enough food, the dump people took some food home and then came back to take more home, they returned and took more home again. There was still lots of food left over, so much that Fr Rich and the prayer group took the leftover food to three orphanages. 

It is not the only time a miracle happened in the dump in Juarez, that miracle of multiplication of food was repeated there many times, e.g. on another occasion when they didn't have enough cartons of milk for everyone when they came to the end of handing out cartons, everyone had a carton of milk. After the miracle on Christmas Day 1972 a beautiful Christian community grew up in the dump and many wonderful events have taken place since then.

A song for David ... a story from Medjugorje

Since 1988, Medjugorje has become a spiritual lifeline to our family. David, our second son, was born April 17, 1981, on Good Friday, a few weeks before the apparitions began in Medjugorje; a significant day, as from them onwards his life would pivot closely around Good Friday. David was born with a hare lip and during the early months and years of his life it became apparent that he had multiple problems, including paralysis affecting his left hand side and, more seriously, a diagnosis of severe aplastic anaemia, a rare bone marrow disease. Children with this disease seldom survived beyond their teenage years, alternating between endless blood transfusions to stabilise their condition to keep them alive in the short term, and then experiencing brief periods of remission.

In 1988 we had returned from Lourdes. My husband Bryan, although an agnostic, travelled to Lourdes with us. He enjoyed his week but spiritually he returned the same, much to my frustration. However, God has his own timing and ways of accomplishing his plan in our lives. I then decided to pray a nine-day novena to Our Lady for Bryan and surrendered him totally into her maternal care. During the novena I came to hear about the apparitions taking place in Medjugorje. Excitedly I shared the information with Bryan and said that I would love to visit the place.A few days later Bryan asked me where exactly Medjugorje was in what was then Yugoslavia and expressed an interest in going there one day. I was totally surprised by this sudden interest and had still not completed the novena I was saying for him. I continued to pray and then decided to book a surprise pilgrimage to Medjugorje for Bryan. I made the arrangements in faith, and then informed him. To my amazement he was delighted and six weeks later I packed his case. Before I shut the suitcase I remembered that I had bought some Rosary beads in Lourdes as a gift for Bryan and had put them in a drawer until I felt it was a suitable time to give them to him. I quickly found the brown wooden beads and placed them on top of his clothes. 

Whilst Bryan was away, our son David had a profound spiritual experience. Because of his poor health he had been allowed to make his First Holy Communion a few months before, at the age of seven. As usual, one evening, at the same time the apparitions took place in St James Church, I lit a candle and placed it in the centre of the kitchen table. I gathered my three children with Hannah, the youngest, on my knee, and began to pray the Rosary with them.I didn't particularly feel in the mood for prayer that evening. I was exhausted at the end of the day and just wanted to put the children to bed. As we began to make the Sign of the Cross, David became rather excitable and seemed absolutely fascinated with the candle. Mummy, mummy, just look at the candle. It's flashing three lights! he exclaimed. We all looked at the candle and it was no different to any other evening it had been lit. We began to pray, and as I glanced up I noticed that David, normally such a fidget, had his eyes gently closed and sat perfectly still without joining in. 

After prayers he continued to sit quietly before eventually opening his eyes. He's gone, he pronounced simply. David, who's gone? I asked. Jesus is gone. After the three flashes of light from the candle, I saw a mist. As the mist cleared, Jesus was standing beside the candle. Do you mean a Child Jesus or a Daddy Jesus, I asked. A Daddy Jesus. He wore a white robe and had wounds on his hands and feet. He then spoke to me and said, You are to pray the Rosary for you are a son of Mary. Jesus then showed me the world of Medjugorje. It was like a moving picture. I saw a church with two high steeples. I then saw Jesus standing beside my daddy. Daddy was wearing a necklace around his neck with a cross. When he comes home he will be leading the Rosary in our family. 

David's prophetic words came true. Bryan had a profound conversion experience in Medjugorje. As he stood listening to Vicka, one of the young visionaries, describe her experiences with the Blessed Mother, he just knew that she was speaking the truth. When he returned home, he was wearing around his neck the brown Rosary beads I had packed in his suitcase. David just pointed to the necklace that he had seen. Bryan was received into the Catholic Church exactly one year later, on the Feast of St Therese of the Child Jesus. Bryan took David to Medjugorje two years later. He was, by this time, quite a sick little boy. He had a wonderful time. He especially loved climbing the big mountain by torchlight. It was the last holiday that David had.

He died from a brain haemorrhage on April 9, 1991. Mummy I don't want to be attached to this drip on my birthday. The Lord heard and answered his prayer. He was in heaven for his tenth birthday. The following year his birthday fell on  Good Friday.