Mar. 26, 2021

THE SMALL NUMBER OF THE ELECT

“Great Saint John Chrysostom, I contemplate you and I honour you.”

--"Come,” he says to me, “in the Name of the Lord. I will conduct you to His Divine Presence.

--"Little sister, be full of courage at this time. Be of strength, of energy. . . One day, I see under my eyes all of the great city of Rome and the Lord tells me:

‘John, the souls who are to be saved on earth are not as many in number as the grains of wheat that rest on the field, after the collection is picked up. I assure you that on the Day of Judgement the greater part of souls will be condemned to burn eternally.’ ”

(9 March 1878)

[Source:  p. 179 Le Ciel en Colloque, in translation].

Reflections on this prophecy :

This week, we have had two major feast days of the Virgin Mother of God, Mary Most Holy. On Thursday we celebrated the Annunciation, the most important Marian day of the year for those who have consecrated themselves to her Immaculate Heart. Today it is the feast of the Seven Sorrows of Mary.

This prophecy seems to add to Our Blessed Mother’s sorrows, and to ours… how few there are who are faithful, in comparison to how many there should be! 

In this prophecy, our souls are the “grains of wheat”. The elect are so small in number, that they are like a remnant left on the ground after the harvest has been collected. 

Is this not distressing?

And why are we compared to wheat?

The answer may be in the fact that wheat is food, it has life in it, just like the Holy Catholic Faith gives life to our souls. And also, our Faith is able to give life to others, in our witness to Christ and His Church.

The image of a harvest is also something to contemplate. Some of the wheat berries have been left behind, lying on the field. Here we see an aspect of what is humanly possible: a human gardener is not able to gather all of a crop in its entirety.

This is our sadness as humans, that we cannot help all persons to conversion to the Truth, even those we love so dearly.

We see this with parents who are sadly unable to help all of their children to come to the Catholic Faith (and vice versa).

There are many reasons why this happens. Sometimes it is due to some attachment that seems to have a stronger attraction, and sometimes it is due to a scandal caused by another or others.

Lord, forgive us if we have ever been the cause of scandal to another!

Last week, we considered how living in luxury deadens a soul. With the advances of technology today, this seems to be the general state of souls. Technology has created a spiritual cancer that is deadening us from the inside out.

God seems to be irrelevant, unrecognized. The reality is that His Kingship is rejected.

But you and I, we are not the ultimate farmers (or gardeners). We are human, with human limitations. We must rely on God and His Angels!

God and His Angels can gather our children, parents, brothers, sisters, and other loved ones into the arms of grace.

And always, our prayers for their conversions please God very much!

When we pray, let us pray for the conversion of all souls still living. Let us ask all of the Guardian Angels to pray with us, and to help us to pray well, for the conversion of their charges.

And remember, unlike false churches, the Catholic Church prays for the deceased.

So when we pray for the souls in Purgatory, let us pray for those in Purgatory from the beginning of time to the end of time!

(In this way, will we not also be garnering graces for ourselves? Let us hope so!)

And when we pray for ALL the Holy Souls, let us especially remember to pray the Holy Rosary and the Stations of the Cross:

Holy Mother Church teaches that praying the Stations of the Cross is the next best thing to offering the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass for the souls in Purgatory!

As we do not have the Holy Mass to offer, let us pray the Stations of the Cross daily.

Dear Sorrowful Mother, teach us to pray well and always, and to place all of our trust in Thee!

Ave, Maria, Mater Misericordiae! Our life, our sweetness, and our hope!

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 [Canon 1825]  If anyone then says that it is not from the institution of Christ the Lord Himself, or by divine right that the blessed Peter has perpetual successors in the primacy over the universal Church, or that the Roman Pontiff is not the successor of blessed Peter in the same primacy, let him be anathema.