August 18, 1945prev home
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For Sister Gabriella of Mary Immaculate79
“I am not inclined to grant private direction, not out of hardness of heart, but out of mercy on the spokesman and souls, too. People must be fortified on their own in order for there to be true fortitude. But she now needs a word, and I will provide it.
“You spoke the first phrase of the Cross for yourself, not understood and taken lightly, and for Me, offended in my orphans, who never receive an offense which is not healed by Me.
“In the times of the Old Law this was already said: ‘Have mercy on the widow and the orphan.’80 I said, ‘I will be the father of those who have no father and whom the world disdains.’
“My army and my court have been composed of the humble and unfortunate. There have been sinners, slaves, peasants, and orphans, and among them the martyrs of the sins of others, the fatherless, have not been lacking. They have never been lacking and have not been inferior to the others in affirming the Kingdom of Christ among peoples.
“Who can judge that heaven or the priesthood or the cloister is the prerogative of those benefited by a normal family? Are a birth certificate and assorted other documents needed here to gain access to the joy of heaven? Holiness is needed here to enter. Nothing more than this. For birth certificates are signed for what perishes, not the soul. The soul is not born when you are born on earth. Its birthday takes place the day on which it comes to God to receive its eternal peace. Those who are called to judge concerning the most delicate circumstances should bear this in mind. What would you say about God if He denied Heaven to someone born illegitimate? That it was an act of injustice. Why, then, do you deny the way, which for them is the way of Heaven, to these children who aspire to Me and whom I inhale into Myself? The child did not ask to be born. The crime is not his. The cross is his. The sins of parents should not be brought down upon their children. I said, ‘Judge not.’ Judge not, for you do not know the circumstances under which someone committed a sin. Judgment falls to Me. To Me alone. Why, then, do you judge twice in this case: once for the child and again for his parents?
“In reality the old Israel, with its pharisaic forms lacking charity, has risen again, stronger than before, egged on by rationalism, which leaves people in a daze regarding the supernatural, and by the new Jansenism chilling off and creating obstacles for souls. This does not amount to proceeding towards the lights of the last time, but retroceding not only to pre-Christian times, but, rather, to the inhuman, obscure methods of the pagan peoples. For my road is now obstructed, the one I have called people to, and this is done against my will.
“You preach that it is not licit to oppose a son’s vocation. You say this to parents, even if they receive all comfort and help from that son, for you say that God is more than a parent. That is correct. I, too, said so. But why, then, do you contend with Me over these children? But if you were enlightened and united to the Holy Spirit, you would have to see all my mercy in this call. You would have to see all my power if from two quagmires who joined to procreate in sin there is born a flower whom I call for my altar. In these tenacious vocations which you disparage you ought to see and feel the sign of the Fatherhood of God, who demands his rights and opens his arms to call women - whom the world would profane and whom you drive away - spouses of the Only-Begotten Son.
“Poor souls! Do you deem them unworthy of approaching the altar as an object if I do not deem them unworthy of approaching Me? I would like to say this to those who offend Me through the innocent ones who weep and ask for mercy without finding it, through these, whom you push back into the impure waves of the world, calling them ‘fruit of the world,’ whereas, if you had charity, justice, and prudence, precisely because they are a fruit of the world, you ought to gather them in to place them in God’s granaries, protected from the lure and inheritance which could destroy what good will created. I would like to say this and also have you consider that, along with the temptation of the world, you give the desolation of doubts about God and his goodness to these flowers that in their lower part have the appetites common to everyone born of woman, which are sometimes aggravated by forms of atavism that only Grace and conviction regarding God’s love hold back.
“But it would be useless for Me to say this to those who deny all that is not themselves. I thus speak to you, Gabriella of Mary Immaculate.
“You have humbled your humanity in the humility of requesting, explaining, and seeing that you are not understood. You have bowed to humility towards men. And the suffering has been very great. Now listen to Me. I am more than men, and my wisdom and justice are perfect.
“Superiors are there to form people in virtues. But I am there to crown them. And I am intervening because it is now the time not to make your energy not only futile, but harmful, because it is compressed in a highly circumscribed mission in which you would be a nonentity barely able to be saved and always on the point of not being saved, for the imprudent goal and bitter experience of these days would create an intimate, but active state of distrust and judgment regarding blind and superficial superiors.
“It is not licit for you to contribute with the proud ones of the new Israel to the ruin of hearts, but gathering in these hearts so that they will not be lost means to leave the place you entered, wrest yourself away from it with the laceration of your fibers, go out to face the future alone, and suffer harsh criticism and accusations of a lack of love, pride, and volubility from your superiors, companions, and the world. For each person who shows comprehension there will be a thousand who deride you. Think it over. It means knowing the tremendous solitude of those struggling alone against customs, preconceptions, and stubbornness. Reproaches, mockeries, hours of doubt, disappointments, straitened circumstances, anguish - all of this is in store for you if you gather in the hearts which I have called and to which I want to give paternity, a name, a home, a spouse, and children. Paternity: God’s; a name: daughters of God; a home: mine; a spouse: Myself; children: the ones for whom they will pray and work. This is because I want them to know that God is good so that they may never think that God is just like those who condemned them as profaned objects, without justice or charity.
“Taking them in means suffering at all times; it means being consumed more quickly and with increased sufferings; it means having to abandon the sweet ministry when you have placed every affection therein; it means experiencing the responsibility of a real mother who has no Mother House, no Superiors, nothing behind her, but who is just like a mother devoid of help who has been left alone in the midst of a brood of children to be brought to adulthood.... And the anguish of a mother who dies leaving behind little orphans who are not yet adults is tremendous. It is a moral agony, and in your case spiritual, too, added to physical agony. What you have experienced until now is nothing in comparison to what you could experience and will experience if you say the second phrase among those I indicated to you: ‘Everything is accomplished!’
“In my Passion I said to the Iscariot, a perpetual representative of all who have the mission of bringing pain to their fellows, ‘Do quickly what you still have to do.’ On Calvary I admitted that everything was accomplished, and not just by Me. Men had also accomplished everything that had to be done to create that hour. Now, too, men have done everything that was to be done to give you your passion. It is now up to you to consummate it to the point of being able to say, ‘Everything is accomplished to keep these hearts safe for God.’ Do you have the courage to say this? Do you have the courage to do this? Observe that up to this point you have drunk the chalice, but now the sponge with gall is waiting for you, and vinegar upon your bleeding wounds, in darkness and abandonment. Do you have the strength to cling to Heaven alone, even if Heaven seems far away? You will know the passion in all its complex cruelty if you devote yourself to this mission.
“I am not a deceiver. I exhibit the picture in all its shades so that no one will say, ‘I did not know’ and be at fault because of not knowing. I give you this assistance of a clear exposition of the future, just as, in spite of the times, I prompted financial aid for the projected work. And I have given you my viaticum to support you, console you, calm you, and temper your tenacity with my gentleness.
“Gabriella of Mary Immaculate, they can all deceive you. I cannot. For months I have been forming you for this work. Reread the messages I gave against everyone’s will, plucking up courage Myself, and only because you are you, in special circumstances affecting you as a woman and a nun, the sick person full of life and the soul that has not yet found the stable balance which is complete, guileless abandonment in Me.
“The first text contains the statement ‘Wherever Christ’s bride goes, the ring of charity goes with her.’
“The second: ‘There are two phrases which are so sublime that I, the Word, said them at the most solemn moments in my life: “Here I am. Let it be done.” But they were never spoken without tears.’
“The third: ‘Always consider, “What will Jesus say about what I am doing?” And if you feel that Jesus is content, go ahead without fear.’
“In the fourth my Mother said, ‘Go to Jesus with the golden rose of your charity’
“In the fifth I previously blessed you for this hour, saying, ‘Peace and blessing to those who live with them in love for Me. May the Blood and the Word create ever new strength in you.’
“The sixth, which was not given to you because it was too severe and it was not the time for you to savor it, contains the statement ‘Let each, with personal exertion, extract the precious diamonds of Wisdom.’
“The seventh: ‘Make your heart expand more and more through its complete openness to Me.’
“In the eighth I said to you, ‘Go with my peace.’ I would not have said so if I had not approved your going.
“In the ninth I repeated to you my viaticum of peace and indicated the words of the Cross.
“I have never contradicted Myself as a Friend and Master, and I am now speaking in the capacity of a King. The last time I even said the great phrase to Maria, ‘Woman, here are your children.’ But I then said to Maria, ‘There are still tears to be shed before saying that phrase to her. It will be the last one for her. Wait before writing to her.’
“I now advise you to isolate yourself with your soul and with Me. Isolate yourself, listen to yourself, contemplate yourself, and gauge yourself. And also contemplate others and the days to come. In silence ideas line up and become clear, like a drawing. And if you extract the word ‘Go’ from them, then don’t hesitate any longer.
“Entrust your spirit to the Father and die as Gabriella to rise again as the Mother of the most unfortunate orphans. I will then say to you, ‘Mother, here are your children: the children of pain.’ If you want to be a mother, manage to stand upright at the foot of the Cross, on the summit of Calvary, amidst mockery and disrespectful curiosity, to receive the most unfortunate portion of humanity.
“And name the foundation ‘of St. Veronica Giuliani.’ Simply in order not to cut all ties to the Order recalling my Francis, who never rejected any form of indigence because he had understood Jesus. And also to recall the woman who on Calvary merited my Face on the linen cloth. I will gave you my Face, impressed upon your heart, so that you will be loving, consoling, and expiating, like the first and the second Veronica.
“Go in peace, and may the charity of God, the grace of Jesus, and the light of the Holy Spirit be with you”.81
79 See note 4.
80 Exodus 22:21; Jeremiah 22:3; Zechariah 7:10.
81 We pass over two handwritten pages containing the episode “Jesus Goes to Carmel with James of Alpheus,” from The Second Year of the Public Life.