Conversions
“Lord, all hearts are in Thy hands: Thou canst bend as Thou wilt the most stubborn, and soften the most obdurate. Do that honor this day to the Precious Blood, the merits, the sacred wounds, the Holy Name, and loving Heart of Thy beloved Son, of granting the conversion of all mankind, especially _________”
How many of us say this prayer or a similar prayer for that list we have of people who we want to join us in the true Faith?
Father Mateo was asked by a priest why he was having no success improving his parish. The priest then detailed all of the projects he had done. And let us stop and think. Haven’t we talked to these people? Haven’t we invited them to say a Rosary with us? Haven’t we asked them to say a Hail Mary each day. Why haven’t they converted?
Father Mateo asked the priest: “Have you tried becoming a holy priest?” The priest answered that he had not. Father Mateo then replied: “Then you haven’t tried anything.”
My friends, aren’t we satisfied with mediocrity? Aren’t we satisfied with being a balanced Catholic?
Saint John Vianney the holy Cure of Ars tells us of three classes of people: “It consists of three classes: the first is composed of those who are entirely for the world; the second are those who are entirely for God; and the last consists of those people who would like to belong to the world without ceasing to belong to God.”
Which class do we want to be in?
We know that it is foolish to be in the worldly class. “I BESEECH you therefore, brethren, by the mercy of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God, your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world; but be reformed in the newness of your mind, that you may prove what is the good, and the acceptable, and the perfect will of God.” (Romans 12:1-2) We know we should not be worldly, because they all go to hell.
And so, are we ready to be entirely for God without reservations, or “would like to belong to the world without ceasing to belong to God.” We want to keep one foot in the world and enjoy its pleasures. Oh, we want to avoid mortal sin like the plague, but we are fine with our regular venial sins. Let us compare mortal sin to a fast acting poison, which immediately kills the soul. Venial sin is a slow acting poison. Yes, a billion venial sins will not condemn me to hell, but each one weakens my soul. Eventually that temptation to commit a mortal sin comes along, and I happily swallow the poison and down I go.
Let us compare two things, manure and ice cream. None of us would willingly eat manure, especially if it stunk real bad. All of us would happily eat ice cream. And so, how much manure is acceptable in our ice cream. My friends, sin is like manure and a much stronger word would be more appropriate, but this is for publication. All sin is manure, and yet we happily mix in a little manure with our bowl of ice cream.
The Cure of Ars says later: “No, my friend; you either belong wholly to God or wholly to the world.” And Jesus said it clearer: ‟He that is not with me, is against me: and he that gathereth not with me, scattereth.”
There is no middle ground. As Saint Augustine says there are two cities we can build up in our souls, and we build one of the other. They can’t both exist in the same place. The first is the City of God and the other is the City of Satan.
What confuses people is that there are three places we can go at death, heaven, hell and purgatory. And so, we aim at purgatory, knowing that it is difficult to go straight to heaven. Difficult, but not impossible. “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible.” (Matthew 19:26)
Actually there are two places to go, heaven or hell. The road to heaven passes through Purgatory. We have a choice, we can do our Purgatory here, purging all worldliness out of ourselves, or leave part of the job for the next life. Old Scratch, Satan, would like to convince us that there is an easy road to Purgatory, and then we can get on to heaven. However, what he wants to do is steer us off of the road to heaven and on to the road to hell, while fooling us in to believing we are on the road to purgatory.
Haven’t you gotten off course? Weren’t you going to tell us how to convert others? “Now therefore saith the Lord: Be converted to me with all your heart.” (Joel 2:12) Why would anyone want to convert to a way of life that we won’t even follow ourselves. We must attract people to the Catholic way of life by living it fully, and letting the serenity that comes from total conformity to the will of God radiate from us.
By the way, have you gotten your spiritual EKG back I talked about a while ago? How healthy is your heart, spiritually?
From the desert,
+Michael pp
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Brother Lawrence
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