****Purgatory & God's Mercy

        Purgatory is a controversial subject as most Protestants don't believe in it, the reason being that it's not clearly mentioned in the Bible. The Bible reveals only truths, but it does not mean that what it doesn't reveal has to be false. By the way, after Jesus ascended to heaven, the Gospels were not written right away and the Bible as we know it now did not exist for about half a millennium until the Catholic Church selected the books of writings that were judged to be inspired by God and put them together as one book. The Church relied mainly upon tradition in spreading the gospel. Jesus never told us to rely solely upon any forthcoming book. There were no Bible Christians for another millennium until Protestants broke away from the Church. My personal belief is that purgatory does exist. It is logical that there is a place for sinners to be purified before entering heaven. God's mercy is so great that if we succumb to his mercy, we are instantly saved. We are forgiven, but we still need to pay the price for having offended him. I came across this video on purgatory today. I had heard about Maria Simma, but didn't know much about her. The video gives you a good start on learning about purgatory. I have a feeling that you would want to watch the other videos in the series after seeing this one. I am thinking of getting the book Get Us Out of Here mentioned in the video myself.
       I believe that being detached from the world and longing to see the Lord can contribute to shortening our time in purgatory or help us skip it altogether. Remember the criminal crucified next to Christ who abandoned himself to him, saying "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom"? The Lord replied, "Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise." 
        My three categories. (1) You put yourself completely in God's hands and are ready to go to him at any time; you have a good chance of going straight to heaven. (2) You are reluctant to abandon yourself to him, but get to do it before you die; you are saved, but you'll have to go through purgatory. (3) You choose not to yield to your Savior; you remain separated from him for all eternity. Our best policy is of course to abandon ourselves to him as soon as we can.

***So Simple to Be Saved!

        In today's first reading from Acts 16, God delivered Paul and Silas from the prison. There was suddenly a severe earthquake that the foundations of the jail shook; all the doors flew open, and the the chains of all were pulled loose. When the jailer woke up, he, thinking that the prisoners had escaped, drew his sword and was about to kill himself. But Paul shouted out, "Do no harm to yourself; we are all here." He rushed in and, trembling with fear, fell down before Paul and Silas. Then he brought them out and said, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" They said, "Believe in the Lord Jesus and you and your household will be saved." We all know that, right? God has made it so simple! You just can't make it more complicated in any way unless you just don't care.

**Our Most Important Growth

       As we grow older, depending upon our age, we grow stronger or weaker physically, but we can always grow stronger spiritually, the sky is the limit. As our time on earth is running out, we should see that growing holier is so much more important than maintaining our health or growing richer materially. That's all I have to say here.

***Cleaning Our Own House First

       The first order of business for all Christians is to be holy. It follows that the first order of business for the Church is to be holy too, free of corruption and scandals and filled with the spirit of teaching its flock with zeal and clarity. We must all clean our own house first, to be free from sin. The two critical issues the Church faces today are the irreverence shown to the Most Blessed Sacrament, the Holy Eucharist, and the ongoing slaughter of the unborn, which I see as part of Satan's plan to destroy the family. If Christ is no longer believed to be present in the Holy Eucharist, then there's no point in celebrating the Holy Mass and nothing to hold the Church together anymore. If abortion is allowed to continue on and Christians remain relatively silent, then we are all hypocrites and we know that Jesus said "Woe to you" to the hypocrites in his day. The fact that these two crises affect the laity more than the general clergy shows that something is not right with the Church. Look how difficult it is for the bishops to come to a decision to bar politicians and public figures who support abortion from receiving Holy Communion. Is the profanation of the Lord no longer a matter of concern? The Catholic Church is the original Church built by Christ upon Peter which Jesus promised that the gates of hell should not prevail against it. I believe that having allowed evil to infiltrate the Church, the Lord is in the process of restoring it to purity again. (Check out my video The Magnitude of Abortion if you haven't seen it yet.)

**Faith Most Treasurable*

        An unwavering, rock-solid faith that's deeply rooted in Christ has to be a most beautiful and wonderful blessing. You'll remain in him under any circumstances, no matter what you go through, for you've found him to be the true God. Your ultimate quest is over. Now you find only emptiness outside of him. Seek and attain union with him to receive this most precious gift.

Christian Duty

         If you know that you are a Christian, then know that God has chosen you and has work for you to do. Be holy first and you'll know what he wants you to do and do it well. You'll reap abundantly for the fruit you produce for him. An idle Christian is one who neglects his duty.

**Pride Our Worst enemy

        Jesus' teaching has always been clear, straight forward, and easy to understand, even commonsensical. Yet it becomes tough learning for us when we are unwilling to submit ourselves to him. In theory, we can become saints in an instant, but some never learn much in their entire lifetime. Pride has to be our worst enemy. What a sad case!

**Dulling of the Conscience

         I corrected a mistake in yesterday's post "Warning, Miracle, and Punishment."  Listening to Conchita again told me that she knew the date on which the miracle would happen, not the warning. Then I am still not sure if God had already told her the date or would let her know when the time comes. Anyway, it should be on the way. I was impressed by what she said about the dulling of conscience with today's generation. It is true that morality has fallen so low that sins are no longer considered sins. I have lived long enough to see the decay taking place. People have always sinned, but they felt the shame before. Now the consciences have gotten so muddy that sinful behaviors are accepted as norms. The coming warning should give us new hope, but it's still up to us to accept God's mercy or not.

**Conversion Reminder

        We pray for the conversion of the whole world, but forget to pray for our own conversion! If we are not totally converted yet, we won't be very effective in converting others. Here, it's OK to put yourself first.

**About the Illumination of Conscience

         Ralph Martin of Renewal Ministries also speaks about the Illumination of Conscience, so you may be interested in listening to him. I have known about Ralph since the days of Charismatic Renewal in the Church. I've heard him speak and read some of his books. He is Spirit-filled and inspiring and I respect him a lot. 

***Warning, Miracle, and Punishment

         Today I came across this newly posted video made in 1980 showing an interview with Conchita, one of the four seers to whom Virgin Mary appeared in Garabandal, Spain, in the early 1960s. The seven minute video tells about the message, the warning, the miracle, and the punishment. It has English captions, but they were poorly translated from Spanish and contain many misspelled words. Besides, they go by too fast and become distracting. So I am posting the full interview lasting three and a half minutes longer with no captions so that you can concentrate on listening to Conchita speak. You may not catch all of what she says, but you'll get the gist of it. Since Conchita already knew the day the miracle is going to take place and will announce to the world eight days in advance, and she's already 72, things could happen anytime now. (You can find a video on the entire Garabandal story listed in the right column of my blog page under Good Websites, Blogs, Videos  . . .) 

****God to Be Experienced!*

         God has created us in his image. He once became one of us to appear on earth and many got to know him well. Even today, we can seek and attain union with him most intimately. So my message is that we can and are expected to experience him. He is not an abstract being or a figment of our imagination; he is more real than anything you see, hear, touch, or know, for he created all of them. And most of all, he loves and desires to know you totally. If you do not experience him, that's because you don't expect to ever experience him. To begin with, you need to have some humility. Cast aside all your doubts and desire to know him. Then open up yourself to him sincerely and you'll experience him. Once you experience him, you'll be so glad that you don't ever want to remain the same again. To shut him out of your life is to cut yourself off from the source of all life.

*****What You Must Realize!!!!!

          God (and heaven) are more wonderful than you can possibly imagine. Satan (and hell) are more horrible than you can possibly conceive. (If you think hell won't be all that bad, you'll be in for the shock of all eternity.) Know all this now, for you don't want to find it out later. If you have God, the God of Christ, you can forget all about Satan and hell. I am giving you the best possible information I have now.

***Obedience Begets Peace

          The Lord God does great things through us who are obedient to him. We do not know what he specifically wishes to accomplish nor how things are going to turn out. They do not concern us. Remaining obedient to him is all he asks of us. This is great, for it brings us peace. I am sure that in heaven all will be revealed to us.

God Strengthens Us

        The Lord loves us and tests us at various times.  He knows our strengths and weaknesses and will test us to strengthen us, not to fail us. So if we love and trust in him, everything becomes bearable and even a joy, no matter what we go through.

*Faith and Prayer Inseparable

         Some say that if you truly have faith, you would just pray for something to God, believe that he heard and will answer you, and that'll do. It sounds logical. Besides, it'd surely simply the spiritual life a lot. Then Jesus told us to pray and believe, and persist in prayer. He did not teach us the Our Father to pray just once. Besides, we need to keep communicating with the Lord through prayer to maintain an intimate relationship. Prayer is sharing ourselves with the Lord and nourishes the soul. We stifle the Holy spirit if we stop praying often. So we pray to the Lord because we trust in and love him. Pray unceasingly and our faith grows stronger too. Faith and prayer are indeed inseparable.

*Our Personal Lord

         Today Friday I prayed the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary as I walked, meditating upon the Lord's Agony in the Garden, Scourging, Crowning with Thorns, Carrying of the Cross, and  Crucifixion. Naturally, I felt bad that he went through all that and couldn't help asking him why, and I heard his tender voice saying "For you" in my heart. Of course, I already knew that, but to hear his personal voice answering me was deeply moving.

***Path to Freedom

          "We are not free until we abandon ourselves completely to God." This truth reveals why sinners do not feel free as well as the exact remedy they need. When we pray for someone to convert for a long time and nothing happens, we begin to get discouraged. It shows that we haven't totally abandoned ourselves to God yet. God wants us to abandon all those we love and everything else to him in order to be his alone. This is how you become free in him. It is the beautiful paradox: the more we become slaves to God, the more we become free. God must have made us this way.