February 23, 1946prev home
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10:30 a.m.
Father had left twenty minutes before... and I was brooding over my great sources of bitterness....
Jesus, who had appeared at the moment of Communion on the right-hand side of the bed, now consoled me in divine fashion, drawing me to his chest. I enjoyed the warmth of his Body through the white woolen cloth of his robe. I felt secure like that, in the gentle grip of his strong hands forcing me to remain that way, held against Him, as if He were simply a human friend. But some tears were falling all the same, for Father’s complaint had caused me pain and his veiled accusation that I had oriented him poorly. Too many things bring me pain! The clinical misfortune which had occurred this morning - which would have terrorized anyone else - had and did not cause me the slightest agitation.... On the contrary! If only it had been for me the murmur in which the voice of the Bridegroom was present saying, “Come!”
But the other matters! Deceitful souls! Disobedient souls!
Proud souls! Restless souls! Sinful souls! Blasphemous souls! That is what brings me pain! I understand, I increasingly understand Jesus’ spiritual passion.... Every soul that is at fault is a blow of the scourge, a piercing by a thorn, a crucifixion.... And I see only a few souls. He contemplated all of them!
I was weeping, and Jesus let me weep. Tears, in this grip of love, held against a completely loving heart, were not bitter here, though. They were sad, but also a relief.
Jesus then ordered, “Write what you experience, for I will dictate later, for Father.” And He had me write without entirely removing his embrace; with his left arm and hand passing over my shoulders, He kept holding me close to his side. He then spoke. Jesus said:
“The strange conduct - to avoid using another adjective - of men seeks justification and tranquilization by way of excuses or reasons which, in alleviating them, weigh upon other men, attributing to them responsibility for the actions performed by those wishing to be relieved. And they often end up saddling God Himself with the responsibility, to the point of accusing Him of allowing a soul to err because He has provided little or no light. For tens of thousands of years men have accused God of having led man to sin through the temptation connected with what was prohibited. And so it will be, until the end of the ages, with everything which is not good.
“Romualdo, why do you reproach Me for not having been clearer? And what more did you want? Don’t you know that I am Charity? Have you still not felt the infinity of this love, which is my essence and which, by paternally supporting its creatures’ wishes and protecting some imprudent acts by them which are not real sins - doing so to keep a soul from becoming shameless because of a small matter, the whim of a little girl, and have her, grateful to the condescending Lord, turn the imprudence into the starting point for an entire holy journey along my ways - this love, which, by forgiving the blameworthy, modifying the initial design, overturned by Satan, for the constant purpose of making the soul a masterpiece, becomes everything to everyone, if only it can help, console, and save?
“Have you still not grasped that in every way I seek to make everyone a saint, that I would like to make each of you a voice of mine, be able to speak to all of you, fill you with Myself, pour Myself out so as to have you where I am - all of you, all, all?
“Don’t you know that as soon as I see a movement in a heart, a good movement, I rush to pour Myself out? You will not, indeed, say, like those who do not know Me, ‘But is He a fool, then, who does not see the future?’ Oh, you won’t say that! Consider, reflect on my agony, and you will understand my conduct towards the good and the not good.
“Is there someone who is holy, beloved to my heart, or simply desirous of being so, and always intent on reaching sanctity? It is proper for Me to go into him to make my dwelling and for him, in union with Me, to find ever-greater strength to sanctify himself.
“Is there someone who, without being one of the damned, always remains a sinner, however, who stays right where he is? Shouldn’t I try to bring him out of his stagnation by attracting him with spiritual gifts? Don’t people act like this with little children to awaken their intelligence, their will to learn, and their attention and have them grow in wisdom as well as height? And so it is, then, that I provide a push, a call, to those who are stationary in their faults, and I offer a gift, a grace, a miracle to infuse into them a desire to get moving, to receive an impulse which will take them out of the place where they are bogged down.
“Is there someone who is a sinner, a great sinner, foreseeably one of the future damned? And why shouldn’t I, the Good Shepherd, the Savior, go on trying to save with my love, until the final hour, until the soul’s separation from the body? Remember Disma.... I had encountered him, once and again, with no apparent benefit, with no apparent intention of encountering him.... In the eyes of the people, the impenitent thief could have seemed like a defeat for Me. It must certainly have looked like a foolish act of weakness on my part to pour Myself benignantly into the jaws of Carit, the thief who - in a gesture of goodness towards the One who, in another valley, nearly a year before, had spoken kindly to the robber to get him to mend his ways - brought Him roast lamb, undoubtedly the result of a theft. But what could the sinner give except sin? Definitely the result of a theft, but one which was purified through the charitable act whose substance it became. Everything must have seemed like this, and some apostles must have tasted a scandal in the meat offered.... But a year later the loving words in the valley near Modin and the loving gaze offered to Carit as one bringing the fruit of his horrendous work, joined to the loving words and loving gazes of a Crucified One and a wounded Mother, saved Disma.
“This is my conduct, Romualdo. I am never the first to point to someone deserving reproach. I am never the first to cast the first stone. I know who I am dealing with, I know. I know you. You are quick to get scandalized - even more than if you were the purest of angels. I do not get scandalized because I am Mercy. I cover spiritual lepers with my merciful speech, as yesterday with the spread-out mantle I covered Eliseus, who was being cleansed, to give you the capacity to remain alongside a leper and love him, helping him with your love to accelerate his resurrection.
“And, besides.... How can you say I didn’t advise you concerning Dora?
“I said, ‘Father should limit himself to performing the functions of his ministry, and nothing more’ - that is, Confession and Communion, for you cannot refuse to administer them to a Catholic who is not excommunicated.
“I said, ‘Go to the Bishop.’ I definitely said so! If Pievano was failing in his duty towards a tormented soul, it was right and proper for there to be someone to force him to concern himself with the matter. And to obtain this someone was needed who would speak. And what’s wrong with that?
“I said, ‘Father should greatly insist on Confession and the Eucharist,’ for the more she feeds on it, the better it will be for her soul, which on its own has less resistance than seaweed in a ditch.
“But I also said, ‘Father should be very vigilant regarding pride and deceit.’ A very revealing sign.
“But I also said, ‘Father should leave everything and concern himself only with Maria and the dictations.’
“And I permitted the disturbing demoniacal apparitions on December 30 and thereafter; and I provided the tremendous dictations on Satan, the clear dictations on the differences between true mystics and doubtful or completely false mystics.
“What more do you want, Romualdo...? I have counseled you, and you are not a child. As I send Dora Raphael, ‘God’s medicine,’ so I send you the Word’s counsel. I do not order. One orders servants, not children and friends; and you are the son and friend of your Father.
“But ‘God’s medicine’ and the ‘Medicine of medicines’ - the holy Word concentrating in Himself all of God in Will, Power, Knowledge, Love, and every other attribute, who possesses in Himself all that We are - cannot be of benefit if they remain outside you, not assimilated. They will sometimes be bitter, like many medicines. But it is to heal and fortify. They should not be looked at alone. They should be introduced into you, in practice, so that they will become useful Medicine.
“And remember that if Lucifer, the most beautiful, and Adam, the most beloved, could degenerate, after having been created with an entirely different destiny, a soul that does not respond fully to its ministry can certainly degenerate and become a ‘nonentity’ I give and I take away. And no one can reproach me for doing so.
“Remember: ‘Woe to the senseless prophets who follow their own spirit without seeing anything. You did not go out against them. You did not erect a defending wall (against Satan and to defend you from Satan, in your spirit) to stand resolutely in battle, on the day of the Lord (the battle of Satanic seductions to keep you from receiving the Day: the Light of God). Tell the ones white-washing without a mixture (and the mixture is sanctity which is painfully, laboriously formed) that the wall will fall, that the flooding water will come, and that I will hurl huge stones and a demolishing storm wind. You, son of man, turn your face against the daughters of my people who prophesy on their own and say, “The Lord God says the following: ‘Woe to the women who work for the purpose of catching souls (through their pride) and thus dishonor Me for a handful of barley and a piece of bread (the eagerness to be known and acclaimed), bringing death to the souls not dying and life to the souls not living (that is, discouraging the just with pain and scandal and flattering the unjust), deceiving my people, which believes in lies. Well then! I will tear what you have woven. I will free the people from your power, and you shall know that I am the Lord. For you, with deceit, have saddened the hearts of the just not saddened by Me.’ ”
“Say this. In your heart. It would not be understood if said in the words of Ezekiel. But on the basis of this, realize what you should do and do not say that you lacked sure guidance. One should not be bitter about being deceived, but about not following the way the Lord points out as good.
“May the Spirit enlighten and comfort you.”
The different tone, in both the voice and the severe majesty, made me understand at once when the Eternal Father took the place of Jesus. It was at the sentence “I counseled you, and you are not a child.” And also because Jesus had stopped holding me, but was listening to the Voice with supreme respect.
It was night. The good Archangel came back, the good companion.174 He looked at me and smiled, but was sad. The radio was broadcasting mundane music, and Marta delighted in it. I worked and contemplated St. Raphael.
What a prodigious thing it is to be able to lose oneself like this in the supernatural without anything’s being able to distract us from it! What wonderful operations God performs in us! In us, poor material, burdensome, superficial, inactive creatures! Oh, the power of “good will”! For I have nothing but that, have never had anything but that. And it has made me - a very human, very defective creature of great passion - what I am: a little soul, very little, but such as to be able to give a bit of joy to my Lord.
The good will of loving the Lord! It has been the golden thread shining on all my actions and channeling and directing them, keeping them from overflowing onto paths where my impulse, my passion for life, could have taken them. Even in the twilight of the worst hours, in which I was really a creature of flesh and blood, the golden thread shone and reminded me of God, and my gaze rose up from the earth to Heaven. A brief gaze at first, then longer and longer, until it established a connection forever, and the lone voice of Divine Love, which would say to me, “Come to Me!” turned into a duet in which I, too, said, “Come! Come in pain. Always come, with everything, but come, come, come, my only Love.” And to shorten the wait and the distance, now following the golden thread, running along it - whereas before I just looked at it - I went; I went without asking, without even thinking I could reach my present state, but only because I wanted to love more and more.
Now it happens that, in the midst of any action, even material, distracting, or disturbing, I remain with Him and find Him again in the words I hear, in work, rest, harmonies, moments of desolation.... And nothing separates me from Him. Isn’t this true, sweet Archangel that know and see the actions of men through the mirror of God, in which everything is reflected and known?
But why do you remain here, sweet angel of mine? Your company - protective and restful - is dear. But do not leave that soul alone. Go, go to her.... I beg you to, for I pity her.... For I think that if you are not there, her soul has not protection. It is so ugly to feel we are alone...! Alone in the stormy hours when Heaven remains closed, either as a punishment or as a trial! It is desolation! It is hell! You, sweet angel, do not know these hours. I do.... And the memory of them has remained like the memory of a nightmare which only in Heaven will fade away. Go, go to her, to the poor, poor sister....
I am praying like this, absorbed, and Marta thinks it is the music which is absorbing me and giving me sweet thoughts. On the contrary... it is contemplation and mercy. But St. Raphael does not go away. And I think of Dora, with a sisterly agony....
174 See the entry for February 20, 1946