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THE ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST ~ CURE OF THE DEAF AND DUMB MAN

(Read Mark vii, 31-37.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY that, in the cure of this deaf and dumb man, Christ would teach you three remedies for your sins, and so enable you to lead a fervent and devote life. The first is that He took him from the multitude apart. He withdrew him from the crowd of people. Thus then is the first remedy you must make use of in order to rid yourself of your sins. Begin by withdrawing yourself from the crowd of thoughts about, and affections for, the things of this world; so many conversations, so many vain diversions which serve only to distract the mind. Begin to enter into yourself, and think seriously on the state of your soul. For it is in solitude that you will receive from God more light and help to correct your sins, and to attend to the acquisition of virtue.

APPLICATION: Apply to yourself the words of the prophet Osee: I will lead her into the wilderness and I will speak to her heart. (Osse ii, 14.) Remove then from you all encumbrance and useless occupations, which are incompatible with a really devote life, if you would advance in the way of perfection. He shall sit solitary and hold his peace; because he hath taken it upon himself. (Lam. iii, 28.)

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Mine eyes have looked unto thee before the morning, that I might think upon thy words. (Ps. cxviii, 148.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY another remedy in those words looking up to heaven. Jesus raised his eyes to heaven, to teach you that you should not only withdraw yourself from the cares and the affections for the things of this world, but that you should give yourself to the serious consideration of the things of heaven and of eternity. Thus did holy David, who said: I had in my mind the eternal years (Ps. lxxvi, 6), for by thus keeping his mind turned towards the eternal years, he despised and cared nothing for those passing and transitory things, which in the course of a few days disappear and vanish in smoke.

APPLICATION: If you will also fix your thoughts on future things, you will easily come to despise the present, and to correct your disorderly affections, and to bestow your serious attention on the acquirement of virtue

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: I said, Now have I begun, this is the change of the right hand of the most High. (Ps. lxxvi, 11.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that you can never raise your mind to eternal things, nor disengage it from affections to present things, without the special and efficacious aid of divine grace. Consequently the third remedy is, that you have recourse to god for this help, and that you earnestly plead for it in prayer. This Christ teaches you here by His example: Looking up to heaven he groaned. Your prayers must not be cold, but they must be fervent and accompanied by tears and sighs.

APPLICATION: Examine then, whether there be found in your prayers tears of real repentance for your past faults, together with the fervent desires of being helped in the acquirement of virtue. A child that asks to be lifted up in its mother’s arms may not always succeed: but it will surely do so if it asks with a pitiful cry.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: When I called upon him, the God of justice heard me . . . Have mercy on me and hear my prayer. (Ps. iv, 2-3.)

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MONDAY AFTER THE ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST ~ GOODNESS AND SEVERITY OF GOD

None is good but one, that is God. (Mark x, 18.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY the goodness and the severity of God, of which the Apostle speaks (ROM. xi, 22), of the goodness with which He bestows His benefits upon us without any merit of ours, the severity with which He visits our offences against Him. And yet, in fact, God is never really severe, for He never punishes as much as He might, for His justice is always tempered with mercy. It is said God is severe when He shows justice rather than mercy. The consideration then of His goodness and of His justice is to be for you a ladder by which you shall escape from the enemy. When you are tempted to distrust, contemplate the goodness of God towards those even who are undeserving of it. When you are tempted to presumption, abase yourself by thinking of the divine justice and severity even towards those who are most dear to Him.

APPLICATION: Reflect whether it is by such considerations you avoid the extremes of discouragement and the excessive security.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: The judgments of the Lord are true, justified in themselves. (Ps. xviii, 10.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY the justice and the severity of God in the persons of so many whom He allowed to fall from the loftiest heights, such as Judas, and Saul, and Solomon. How many there are who shamefully fall from sublime heights of sanctity and are lost in hell, many perhaps for their first sin! Oh, what a terrible thought! On the other hand consider the goodness of God towards yourself, in bearing with you after so many sins and heaping blessings on you. Assuredly you cannot attribute this to anything in yourself. It comes entirely from His goodness.

APPLICATION: Beware however lest you think yourself secure, since you cannot tell if God will still extend His goodness towards you, by reason of your poor correspondence with it. To save your soul God must continue to favour you with His efficacious aid, which He is not bound to give you. See then that you correspond with His divine grace.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Forsake me not, O Lord my God, give, thou God of my salvation. (Ps. xxxvii, 22, 23.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that of God takes from you the favours and graces of His goodness, you will then be eternally lost. Thou shalt be cut off. You will be cut off as a useless branch from the tree of life without pity and cast into the unquenchable fire.

APPLICATION: Like unto one therefore standing between hope and fear, ever recommend yourself most fervently and constantly to God and to His mercy. Remember that if He is good and benignant, He is also just and severe.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me, for my soul trusteth in thee. And in the shadow of thy wings will I hope, until iniquity pass away. (Ps. lvi, 2.)

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TUESDAY AFTER THE ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST ~ THE SIN OF PRIDE

He hath scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart. (Luke I, 51.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY that pride, which is an inordinate desire of self-exaltation or of superiority, brought about the fall of the angels and of Adam, aspiring as they did to make themselves equal to God. How much then to be dreaded is this vice, which was to be found not only in the earthly but also in the heavenly paradise. Lucifer aspired to make himself like unto God by lording it even over the stars: I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. (Isa. xiv, 13.) Adam aspired to become even as God Himself in knowledge: You shall be like gods, knowing good and evil. (Gen. iii, 5.)

APPLICATION: See then how imperative it is that, as regards knowledge or position, you should know how to keep within the limits God has appointed for you. If you wish to exceed these, you must be numbered among the proud.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: He that worketh pride shall not dwell in the midst of my house. (Ps. c, 7.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY the disastrous ruin caused by the pride of Lucifer and of Adam. Lucifer fell in one moment, with all his followers, from the empyreal heaven above to the depths of hell. And these were some of the noblest spirits and fairest creatures that had come forth from the hand of God! Oh what a great evil must pride then be, A single deliberate thought of which resulted in such irreparable loss. Not the less disastrous was that which Adam suffered in the earthly paradise. He was deprived of the dominion he had hitherto possessed and the original justice; he was condemned to an infinity of afflictions.

APPLICATION: Reflect how Adam was punished not only in himself but in all his posterity likewise, and that this great punishment and irreparable evil never decreases or ceases. And will you allow vice so hated and punished by God to predominate in you?

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Thou hast rebuked the proud; cursed are they that err from the commandments. (Ps. cxviii, 21.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that if you would keep this vice of pride in word and mind far from you, often consider what you are, and Who God is. Thus you will learn how just it is that you should be subject in all things and conformed to His divine will. In order to banish it from your words, consider how disedifying and even ridiculous it seems to you in others. Fly then from pride both interiorly and exteriorly. But it is an insidious vice which easily insinuates itself even unto good works, and if you are not careful it will sometimes surprise you and get the better of you.

APPLICATION: When then you perceive pride or vanity in yourself banish it from you at once, either by an act of humility, or, when it is very importunate, by despising it and turning your mind to other thoughts. You will be free from much sin, if you know how to fly from this vice. You will be indeed unhappy if you voluntarily allow it to rule in you.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Thou wilt save the humble, but wilt bring down the eyes of the proud. (Ps. xvii, 28.)

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WEDNESDAY AFTER THE ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST ~ LOVE ONE ANOTHER

Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self. (Matt. xix, 19.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY how great is the debt which you owe to your Creator and Redeemer, Who went so far as to die on a hard gibbet for you. It is the same debt which you owe to your neighbour, to whom God has ceded all the claims He had upon you. For seeing that of Himself He has need of nothing, Hw wills that you should do for your neighbour all that you owe to Him your master.

APPLICATION: Have you then the heart to refuse Him this just acknowledgment, which He asks of you, in exchange for the countless benefits He has bestowed on you, namely to help the necessities, and solace the afflictions of your neighbour?

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: What shall I render to the Lord for all the things that he hath rendered unto me? (Ps. cxv, 12.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY that you are bound by the law of charity to love your neighbour as yourself, and to feel all his sorrows and losses as your own. But the sorrows and losses, that you should feel most intensely for, are the spiritual evils of the soul, because they are the greatest of all and are the least guarded against, because the soul allows itself to be led like a slave to hell without making the least resistance. To be freed from corporal evils every one will look to himself, but how few seek to help liberate from the evil of sin, and how often even is it rejected and despised!

APPLICATION: If you saw a dear friend of yours taken off as a slave would you not be moved to pity? Would you not do your utmost to procure his freedom from that bitter fortune? Why then are you not much more moved to pity over those souls who are real slaves of Lucifer! Why do you not strive to rescue them from his hard service, and to restore them to Christ? At the price of all His blood He has ransomed and healed them.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Blessed is he that considereth the needy and the poor; the Lord will deliver him in the evil day. (Ps. xl, 2.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that you must not draw back from this holy enterprise because of your weakness, and because you do not possess the gifts it seems to require. Do you not hear the words in which you are told: Recover thy neighbour according to thy power. (Ecclus. xxix, 26.) You cannot perhaps speak from the pulpit, nor cross the ocean in order to win souls to God. But souls may also be saved by private counsel, by prayer, by penance and by good example. Oh how much good you can do for souls in this way! For the kingdom of God is not in speech but in power. (1 Cor. iv, 20.)

APPLICATION: Observe however the warning which the same inspired writer here (Ecclus. ib.) gives you. Take heed to thyself that thou fall not. In drawing others from evil expose not yourself to the danger of falling therein. In order to help others do not neglect your own good, by forgetting prayer and mortification. Strive to do all necessary precautions. Some there are, who after having sent many souls to paradise have unhappily been buried in hell!

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Draw me not away, O Lord, together with the wicked, and with the workers of iniquity destroy me not. (Ps. xxvii, 3.)

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THURSDAY AFTER THE ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST ~ CHRIST THE JUST JUDGE

His fan is in his hand. . . he will gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire. (Luke iii, 17.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY that the fan, which Christ hold s in His hand, signifies the judicial power which belongs to His as God and as Man; as God because of His supreme and divine power; as Man because He merited this power in divers ways, principally by allowing Himself to be treated as a criminal before earthly tribunals. Truly just is it that Our Lord should be seated on His throne in majesty to judge all men, Who for the salvation of all men submitted to be condemned by judges most iniquitous and most unjust. Rejoice then with Him in this glory that He will receive in that last day.

APPLICATION: Endeavour to beg His mercy now whilst He is still your advocate, for in that day as your judge He can only show you rigorous justice. Reflect seriously too what will be your lot on that day. Will you be as the wheat or will you be as the chaff?

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: The Lord hath reigned . . . justice and judgment are the foundation of his throne. (Ps. xcvi, 1-2.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY that the good resemble wheat because of the multiplicity of the fruit they produce, sometimes even a hundred-fold, and by the health of spirit which they maintain in the world. The bad resemble straw, because of their sterility, their levity and inconstancy. At present the good are mingled with the bad, because the bad can serve and be of great use to the good, as the straw to the grain, by giving them occasion of becoming more mortified, and more humble. This mingling of straw and of grain, of the good and bad, is to be found the world over.

APPLICATION: If you are like the grain mortified and crushed, envy not the straw that is proud in its lightness, and which will be soon separated apart and cast to the winds. I will scatter them with a fan. (Jer. xv, 7.)

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: The wicked are like dust which the wind driveth from the face of the earth. (Ps. I, 5.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY the end for which this separation takes place: He will gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire. (Luke iii, 17.) Heaven is the abode where the elect will be safe and secure, gathered like grain into the granary. They will rejoice in being all united together in love, praising and blessing God, and in not being constrained to abide among the wicked who afflicted them. How much better then is it to procure for yourself at any cost to be as the good grain, than to be cast aside as the straw and thrown into eternal fire. There the wicked will burn indeed like straw, yet still continue to suffer in unquenchable fire.

APPLICATION: Reflect then seriously, whilst still there is time, what it means to burn eternally in the midst of a fire so fierce, so sharp, that our fire in comparison with that of hell is , as the Saints have said, a mere picture of painted fire. Let us then be found as good wheat before the judge.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Thou shalt make them as an oven of fire, in the time of thy anger: The Lord shall trouble them with his wrath and fire shall devour them. (Ps. xx, 10.)

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FRIDAY AFTER THE ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST ~ REMEMBRANCE OF CHRIST

Do this for the commemoration of me. (Luke xxii, 19.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY that you should ever be diligent as the Apostle St. Paul counsels us (Heb. xii, 3-4), in thinking about Jesus Christ. He, our crucified Redeemer, is the remedy of all your ills. Let therefore your assiduous thought be to think diligently Who it is Who suffered for you. It is the King of glory Who indeed from the beginning of the world suffered in His saints, in Abel, in Joseph, in Jeremiah; but now He no longer suffers in His own servants only, but in Himself. And from whom does He suffer? Even from the very persons for whom He hung on the cross, from sinners. What does He suffer? A torment in every way most cruel, most ignominious and unjust.

APPLICATION: Enter into yourself in order to penetrate fully these truths. For you will thus gain great help in the small sufferings you have to endure.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Behold, O God, our protector: look upon the face of thy Christ. (Ps. lxxxiii, 10.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY that nothing will so strengthen you to suffer, as to think often of the passion of Jesus Christ. Nothing so animates and invigorates a soldier as to see his king himself, covered with wounds and bathed in blood, in the front line of the battle.

APPLICATION: Yet perhaps you may think you do not need to strengthen yourself. Reflect a little how you so easily lose heart as every slight thing, and then neglect the service of your Lord.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: The son of iniquity shall have no power to hurt him. My hand shall help him, and mine arm shall strengthen him. (Ps. lxxxvii, 22-23.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY the confusion that all your own unworthiness should arouse in you, when you ponder on it at the foot of the cross. Your sin does not harm Christ, yet see how much He did on the Cross to deliver you from it. But to yourself sin does infinite harm. Yet, notwithstanding, what have you done to remove it far from you? Have you gone so far as to give even a drop of blood for it? Ah truly does the Apostle say: You have not yet resisted unto blood. (ibid.)

APPLICATION: Reflect then that not only will you not shed a drop of your blood to atone for your sin, but neither will you bear any slight on your reputation, any injury to your health, nor will you deprive yourself of the least satisfaction. Is it not so? When St. Paul bids us resist and fight until the very end of the struggle, even unto blood, he means that we are not to tolerate sin, which Jesus shed the very last drop of His blood to destroy.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: A sacrifice to God is an afflicted spirit; a contrite and humble heart, O God, thou wilt not despise. (Ps. l. 19.)

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SATURDAY AFTER THE ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST ~ TEMPTATION

Begone Satan, for it is written: The Lord thy God shalt thou adore and him only shalt thou serve. (Matt. iv, 10.)

CONSIDER FIRSTLY that when the devil tempts you to evil, he wishes to put his foot on your neck, and to trample upon you as a vile slave. As, however, he can never force you or do you violence, he can but instigate and incite you. Therefore he strives to bend your will, and make you abase yourself by freely consenting to his wicked suggestions.

APPLICATION: What is to be thought of this shameful homage that, by sinning, you have perhaps so often paid to the devil? Are you not filled with confusion, in recalling that you have so often placed yourself under the foul feet of one whom you should rather have trampled upon?

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS. How long shall my enemy be exalted over me? (Ps. xii, 4.)

CONSIDER SECONDLY that the devil has always the very worst designs upon you, though he seems to ask you only to bend and relax a little. For by so asking you merely for a beginning of evil, which does not seem great, or frighten you, such as a look at or wish for forbidden fruit, as he did with Eve, it is afterwards easy for him to obtain all he wants, on account of the extraordinary facility we have of passing from small evil to a greater one.

APPLICATION: Why then not make a determined resistance to the suggestions of your enemy? At least do not add that prostration of yourself before him, which is involved in the passing on to the commission of grave sin?

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Deliver me from my enemies, O Lord. To thee have I fled. (Ps. cxlii, 9.)

CONSIDER THIRDLY that from the act of prostrating oneself to be trampled upon by Satan, one passes on to the state of being a public highway whereon he is allowed to pass forward and backward at will. Such is the condition to which the sinner arrives at last, passing from actual sin to habitual sin. By actual sin, thou hast laid thy body on the ground, as the prophet Isaias says; by habitual sin, as a way to them that went over. (Isa. li, 23.) This is what Satan aimed at when he asked of you but one step. He wishes never to lift his foot off you, and to trample on you as his slave for all eternity.

APPLICATION: Do not be so senseless as to let him delude you into taking the first step, and afterwards becoming a highway to all that is evil. How many alas! Even among the good, have been tricked in this way, by giving way to very little in the beginning, and afterwards to the greater evil, and that without any remedy! Guard against yielding even one step before your sworn enemy and betrayer.

AFFECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS: Keep me from the snare, which they have laid for me, and from the stumbling-blocks of them that work iniquity. (Ps. cxl, 9.

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