Catholic during the Great Apostasy

1.If you want to be good, you must first believe that you are bad. You will never become better if you do not desire spiritual progress. Not wanting to progress means the same as going backwards. So persist in good resolutions, and if you can hasten to come to the use of the peace of soul resulting from an improved life. A sign of spiritual improvement will be that you will notice faults which you have not seen before.

The sick person can already be congratulated when he/she has recognised that he/she is sick. Do not be mistrustful, but examine yourself and try to convince yourself clearly of your spiritual progress through the firmness of your soul and the diminishing of your lusts. Then you can consider yourself a beginner in the perfect life, when you have attained complete power over yourself. It is an incalculable good to be master of oneself and to come into agreement with oneself. A virtuous person is always the same, a sinner changes every moment.

2 If you wish, you can reach the pinnacle of holiness in a single day if you detach yourself wholeheartedly from creatures and turn to God.

And you will know by the following signs that you are living a life of interiority and union with God: if you are not fond of worldly things; if you love yourself in solitude; if you strive for what is more perfect; if you despise the opinions and rules of the world.

And you will find great help in the acquisition of all virtue in the constant meditation on the life and death of the Lord Jesus. This is the book of life; in it alone, though all other books are lost, as in a rich and abundant library, you will find everything that leads to salvation. It is not enough, however, merely to know and meditate on Christ the Lord; but you must necessarily imitate Him and so live as He taught by word and example. Only by means of lines can you correct the uneven zigzags.

3 There is a beautiful sentence from one of the Masters of the spiritual life: those who want to progress in goodness should live as if they were constantly healing themselves. Those who want to reach the summit of perfection must overcome many obstacles that obstruct their way, such as, for example A disordered love of self or of creatures; a superfluous attachment to worldly things, causing sadness and grief at their loss; a superfluous preoccupation with comforts: in food, drink, conversation and amusement; a preoccupation with worldly things and a stubborn insistence on one’s own opinions and desires; inattention to inner movements and a disdain for divine inspirations, which resound in the recesses of the soul.

These are the most important obstacles to spiritual progress. In order that you may succeed in removing them, you must be attentive and truly tireless in spiritual work. Let all your actions be animated by virtue, let them be strengthened by the most perfect aim and accompanied by diligence and zeal; let them be ennobled by a pure intention, so that the works thus performed may realise the high concept you have of perfection. Progress is not founded on the multiplication of pious exercises, but on the perfect fulfilment of daily works. For it is not so much the work itself, but rather the manner in which it is done that deserves praise.

4.Day after day passes, time passes, and no one can return the past to you. In fact, you should not say: I am alive, but: I will live, because life always turns towards tomorrow. In this way, you spend your life searching for the means to satisfy your needs and fantasies; meanwhile, old age comes, death approaches and finds you unprepared.

Just as travellers, having embarked on a lively journey, do not know when they have reached the end of their journey, so the course of your life, which you follow in your dreams as well as in your waking life, will pass by unnoticed if you are constantly preoccupied and distracted; it is only at the end of this earthly pilgrimage that you will know that it is coming to an end.

So why are you still hesitating and procrastinating? Recognise the value of time; use it wisely; do not waste a day or an hour in vain, for such a loss cannot be recompensed. You do not allow anyone to take away your possessions, you are ready to sue and sue for the smallest patch of land, and you allow yourself to snatch your life and your time from anyone, being wasteful in those things in which only scrounging is allowed. Reflect on your life, count the years you have lived, and even if you were a hundred years old, you would find that a great deal of time would have to be subtracted from those years as futilely lost. Count the hours you have slept, the hours you have lost in feasts, arguments, idle chats with friends and amusements, add to this the moments you have not made the most of and you will see how little you have left for a life properly understood and you will admit that you are dying prematurely.

You often complain about the past years spent in laziness; why don’t you at least use the present years in such a way that one day you will be able to say: I could by no means make better use of time than I did. Only the present day, and even its individual moments, are called the present. Why, then, do you waste today, if it only belongs to you, and why do you concern yourself with tomorrow, which does not belong to you. The greatest hindrance to the proper use of time is postponement. Live today, for tomorrow may not be yours.

5. In everything you think, say and do, disregarding no other considerations, look only to God and follow His will in everything. He who has chosen God as his guide will never stray from the straight path. You will place your possessions in safe keeping if you refer all your works to the glory of God and do everything with a mindfulness of the presence of the One who sees everything, sustains everything and rules over everything.

From His sight you will not hide anywhere; He watches not only the words and deeds of men, but penetrates even the innermost thoughts. Even if you close the doors and shut the windows, do not think that you are alone; God is with you, and your soul, which you cannot block from Him, should be His temple. In Him we live, we move and we are (1). Towards Him eat and drink, with Him use your walk, with Him do your business, to Him apply your life. Be worthy of His sight and that honour, that He may look upon you with pleasure and liking. The fact that you are constantly under the supervision of the All-Seeing Judge necessarily impels you to live a pious life.

Live as if there were no one in the world but you and God. Accept with joy whatever His providence decrees for you, whether it be success or failure. After all, you are looking for God: what difference does it make whether you reach Him by this or that path, so long as you reach Him one day.

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Cardinal Jan Bona – Guide to Heaven. Tarnów 1900.

Footnotes:

1) Acts XVII, 28.