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We have been created to know God, to love Him and to serve Him in this life and to enjoy His Presence in eternal life. "Be holy" is not just a sentence, it is a command of God.
Unless we seek God, our lives will always have a void which is our misery and unhappiness. True happiness and joy can only be found when we find God.
We fail to find Him because He is always with us but we are not with Him. Sin separates us from God just as a cloud would impede the sun to shine on us, therefore sin deprives us of the Light of God which is the life of the soul.
Jesus is the light of the world, He is the light of every man that has come into existence, because He is the Son of the Living God, therefore the Heavenly Father has granted all power and authority to Him who is also our Saviour and Lord.
We must live a life in imitation of Christ in order to do the Will of God the Father.
As Catholics we believe in the Holy Trinity: three divine persons in One God. We believe in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy
Spirit; three different persons but One single God. This is a great mystery of our faith, which we must accept with humility, since there is only one God, one Saviour, one Lord and one sanctifying Spirit (Eph 4:4-5)
Because of God's Majesty, Power, Wisdom and Glory beyond our limited understanding, He has revealed Himself to us through His Son Our Lord Jesus Christ, so that everyone who believes in Him will be saved. He has sent His Holy Spirit to dwell in our hearts so that we can come to know Him and to yearn for Him.
The Spirit of Goodness and Holiness will reveal everything
to us when we live a life according to the pattern of Christ. Jesus is also the son of
Mary, this makes Mary a very special person for us. We will discuss Our Lady further on.
Repent, the Kingdom of Heaven is near [Matthew 3:2], Repent and believe in the Good News [Mark 1:15].
These were the words of St. John the Baptist as He prepared the way for the Lord. Jesus also started His Ministry with these words, promising a Kingdom of Peace, Love, Justice, Truth and Integrity. He said that the Kingdom of Heaven is within, in other words, He called us to start something within ourselves far away from the things of this world.
He said if you want to be my disciples you must deny yourselves, take up your crosses daily and follow me [Matthew 16:24]. This doctrine is the door to holiness and is grounded in humility and detachment.
We are accustomed to selfishness, we work for our personal achievements, for our pleasure and for the fulfilment of our ambitions, we become egocentric when we live to please ourselves and not God. To deny ourselves we must live through Him, in Him, with Him and for Him only, this implies renouncing all the personal triumphs of our lives in order to let Christ reign in us, this calls to live for the interests of God and not so much ours, This calls for control of the demands of the flesh and the senses. We are called then to renounce all the things of this world so that we can possess God. [Matthew 5:3]
1 We must renounce the world and be contented with little in other words we must exercise poverty and detachment, the practice of physical and spiritual Charity. 2 We must overcome the flesh by continence, chastity and self-control and 3 we must overcome the devil who entices us to pride, selfishness, and continuous dissipation by a life of Prayer and communion with God.
The Church is the mystical body of Christ. He is the head and we are the members, He suffered and died and in the same manner the members are destined to suffer and die to make up for whatever was lacking in his sufferings [Colossians 1:24]. No one has escaped suffering because this is part of our daily bread. Suffering is part of the training that we must undergo in order to become obedient, to be purified and to accept the Will of God [Hebrews 12:6-7].We are dust and we are going back to the dust by divine decree, therefore we get old, our bodies suffer disease and eventually we die.
Jesus has asked us to accept the cross, which is made up of all the contradictions that we find daily. By the merits of carrying the cross we are humbled, we overcome impatience, we acknowledge our weaknesses and recognise the strength of God. We are thrown off the horse of our pride just like St. Paul [Acts 9:2] and if we accept the Will of God, He can take control of our lives to make us holy.
To become holy means, to accept the good and the bad that comes our way. When a couple gets married, they accept each other in good and bad times; in the same way when we establish a relationship with God we accept Him as He is, without having the right to make any demands, because whatever He wills is perfect and will mould us to His liking. God knows better and He chastises [Hebrews 12:6] those whom He loves just as any good father here on earth would do.
The cross is not a punishment, it is a gift of God to make us holy,
a price for our reward and the Throne of our King. To receive the cross daily will give us
great joy and understanding of God, who loved us so much that He became flesh to give His
life for us. [John 1:14]
As we follow the Lord, we must imitate his life of Love and Charity, we must love God and neighbour, using our detachment, we must be prepared to share with others our time, our love, our faith and our belongings if necessary.
Once we accept the cross, we are then prepared to follow the Lord to Calvary, in other words we become ready for our own crucifixion.... not physical but spiritual. On the cross we must crucify our sinfulness, our passions, our pride, our wickedness, and we must overcome the temptations from the world, the devil and the flesh. [Galatians 5:24]
On the way to Calvary we immolate our lives also in imitation of Mary the Mother of Jesus. As we come to our personal Golgotha the Lord will say: Father forgive them because they don't know what they do when they sin. He will give us his mother to be our mother, he will tell us: behold your mother and we will accept Mary as our Mother, since She is the new Eve, the Mother of the living, who are all the children of God. There will the Lord feel thirsty for our love and promise us to take us to His Kingdom. It is there that He will accomplish his work of Salvation in us and give his life for us in exchange for our eternal life.[Luke 23:34-46]
When we receive Jesus in the Holy Eucharist we are living those
moments of our Salvation and indeed we eat of His flesh and drink of His blood just as He
asked us to.[John 6:48-63]
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The
Work of God
www.theworkofgod.org