the spectrum heart cathedral system

Something I've realized while listening to old tunes as a severe thunderstorm rolls in…

…I've forgotten what love feels like.



I'm cleaning out my old laptop and it's blowing my mind. It's breaking my heart.

Ventrium was in 2014. How in the world have SIX YEARS passed since he died up in the woods?



Back when the Lotus Cathedral System still existed, back when "I" was still Jay, when I was a man who loved with his ENTIRE HEART, honestly to an extent of sincerity and passion that boggles me, I loved so many people, SO MUCH.

I don't… I don't even know what that would feel like, now.

Why?


…It scares me. Now that I've re-found my religion, now that I'm more Catholic than ever, it's severed something in me. Which is wrong, somehow. Now that I'm religious, I have no relationships. When I do have relationships, I lose my religion.

This has to be the devil's work. There should never be such a split, in anyone's life, between Love and love. It's wrong.



I want to kiss Chaos Zero again and I don't know how and I want to weep over that but I don't know how.
Do you have any idea how awful that feels? How horrific it is to realize that my emotions are absolutely SHUT DOWN and I can't even hold this fragile gorgeous being that I've loved for LITERALLY SEVENTEEN YEARS.

…God have mercy on us what if it's trauma.
What if it's trauma. What if this all boils down to having been so utterly wrecked by sexual abuse that I am full-on terrified of so much as holding someone's hand because it might escalate into something unbearable. Because hey, that HAS happened.
But how do I get over it? Is that even the proper phrasing? How can I heal that wound, that gaping wound that I have no clue how to manage on my own, this injury that's on par with a freaking shotgun blast to the ribs that I have literally just been trying to hide under a bloodsoaked shirt? Not even medicating it, not even wrapping it up, just trying to keep it out of my own sight because the reality of it is too terrible. And after a while I guess the blood just looks normal.
But it never actually stops hurting, does it. Even if you ignore it. And once in a while something bumps it and the sudden pain overwhelms you and THEN you realize that hey, I'M DYING HERE.


In the Lotus Cathedral, I had so much love, in me and around me and everything.
I had friends. I had family. I had a daughter, for God's sake.
I had Genesis, my best friend. I had Laurie, my superego soulmate. I had Chaos Zero, my other half, as it were; my dearly beloved who I would still marry if I had the chance.
And that's the other problem.
He's, quite honestly, the only thing that would change my mind against entering the consecrated life. Like, it's either become a nun, or marry a video game character. I'm dead serious though. I'd love to have it both ways but I have no idea if that's possible, which means I have to start researching the hagiographies of married saints because God knows I cannot live like this. I absolutely cannot live with feeling like I am forced to choose between loving God and loving anyone else, because that can't be right.

…And you know how I know that?

Because, like this, I can't actually love GOD, either.


Something in me has been scraped out with a rusty razor and there's this hollow ache smack-dab in the middle of my chest that feels like sobbing and yet, I'm utterly detached from it, cut off like a guillotine to the throat. It's that "blue voice" that the BLCS used to talk about-- that sole mourning woman who lived in our heart and never stopped crying. Lamentations. She just weeps, nonstop, like you cannot imagine. The pain is unbearable. And perhaps that's exactly why we/I cannot feel it. Right now, it is unbearable.

But darn it all I WANT to bear it. I don't CARE if it rips me in half, it SHOULD, it NEEDS TO, or I swear I will NEVER be able to feel anything again.

But I cannot even walk up to Chaos Zero in headspace because if he so much as reaches out and touches my face I swear I am going to shatter into PIECES because you know what the DEEPEST problem is here?
I FEEL TOO FILTHY TO ACCEPT LOVE.

If he, this creature that I love SO MUCH I could honestly die from it, die for him, die from joy in the best circumstances-- if he cannot even look at me right now because if he does, I will crumple into agonized sobbing, there is a BIG PROBLEM and that problem is that I CAN'T PARTICIPATE IN THAT LOVE RIGHT NOW.

My sense of identity is screwed. I want to love but I am ashamed and I am AFRAID and I don't even know how to receive AFFECTION without being terrified that I've got to dissociate and perform.
How did I do it as Jay? How did I DO it? How did "he" throw himself heartfirst into everything to the point where he became this absolute light-source of love? His very presence in the System was a literal catalyst for emotional sincerity and genuine selfless compassion.
What happened to him? What happened to me? What changed, between him and me, that just… hollowed me out, and killed him? Where did he go? If I'm his "spiritual successor," if I'm literally the next step of the bloodline as it were, the next piece of "Core" history, then… why am I so broken?

Why do I feel like CANNON all over again? Ten years ago or more? Marywood, 2009? Waking up to trauma and wishing I were dead? Well, there you go.


I don't hate S. (I will not call them by their "chosen name" because my faith prioritizes the name they were given, legally and originally, the person they were before dissociating.) And I want to be their friend. But truly I don't know if I ever knew them, either. Because when I was living in North Carolina I was either talking to Oliver or Kris or Kyo or… gosh I don’t even remember their names anymore. But it felt jagged, broken, confused. So did I. It feels wrong, even now talking about it, like choking on dirty dishwater. It feels filthy and sick. I can't look at it; I want to throw up and cry and scream and curl up and die.

And that's what I feel whenever I try to feel love, now.

That ugly ugly stuff is getting in the way. It's shame, to the point of crushing mountains, heavier than a dying star. It's apocalyptic shame, the sort that WILL annihilate you if you don't get a handle on it.

Where does God come into this?

I'm a Catholic, okay? I'm a Christian. And I do love God. But how genuine is my love if I'm having this problem with EVERYTHING ELSE?

Yesterday was Easter. We just got through Holy Week and I spent Good Friday night standing outside in my pajamas, the wind howling and snow whipping around my dirty head, crying hysterically that I was scared to death because I knew how sinful I was and I KNEW I was sorry, I KNEW I didn't want to sin or do wrong or hurt anyone or offend Jesus, ever, but I couldn't feel anything about it. My mind was confessing contrition with frankly panic-stricken sincerity, but my emotional capacity was bankrupt. There was no feeling behind the words, and THAT is TERRIFYING as a Christian because hey, does that mean I'm actually sorry at all?
God help me, I'm not sure what to do about this.

I need to be broken open. I need my heart to be shattered to flipping PIECES because honestly that is probably the ONLY WAY I'm going to get this hardness out of me.
I need to make a playlist of all the most wrenching love songs I know, and I need to go talk to Chaos Zero and not run away, and stay there for like a solid hour even if I spend most of that time sobbing. God knows that alone is progress, because I cannot even CRY right now, not without immediately reaching for a knife.

…God, where is Laurie?

Now THAT thought kills me. God I miss her, so much I actually am tearing up right now. And that's always been her saving grace-- she was always isolated from the potential horror of romance, always separate from the idea of being a partner or anything of the sort. She was always just my white knight, my soldier, my protector, my friend. And THAT is safe.
But NC tried to murder her in that respect. Oliver and the rest of the Broken Arrows wanted to be in a "romantic relationship" with her and her VERY EXISTENCE STOOD AT TOTAL ODDS TO THAT VERY CONCEPT.
She did die from it, I know. I remember. They all died. But… the Spectrum can be reborn, truly, in Christ as it must be, as it truly needs to be. She's Laurel now, or Lauriel, I can't quite tell; she's unstable, but she's alive. Somewhere, somehow. And she's safe again, untouchable, ineffable, real only because OF that. Unblemished, undefiled, virginal.

That’s the problem with everyone else that I love.
Laurie is the ONLY PERSON who has basically decreed to the point of spitting blood that she will NEVER, and CAN never, be a danger to me in that respect. She can never be romantic, she can never be intimate, she can never be sexual.
And that is THE ONLY REASON WHY SHE IS SAFE and that is also the MAIN REASON WHY I AM TERRIFIED TO EVEN GO LOOK FOR HER, because I believe that I am tainted and ruined and if I so much as look at her I will kill her.

…

The problem isn't everyone else. The problem is me.
I'm afraid to hold Chaos Zero because I'm afraid I'll ruin him. That's why I want to die and weep forever when I look at him, because I can feel this awful WRONGNESS in me and God knows I never want that to touch him.


…Love is only safe in the League, somehow.
I NEED to remember that.
And that is ALSO why I'm so FURIOUS on some level for S trying to steal it. For YEARS, the ONLY refuge from my trauma has been remembering the pure, chaste, genuine love between individuals in the League, notably in Dream World, but when S touched it, they CORRUPTED IT. They made it sexual and honestly I want to RAGE AND WEEP over that. I am absolutely BENT on making a website in the near future to attest to the TRUTH of the League and I need to like put that on a poster and glue it to my eyeballs so I am DRIVEN to work towards that end EVERY DAY.

That's slightly off-topic. And yet it's not. Because I'm listening to Kreva and when you drop the pitch on his voice to 80% he sounds like Xorane and he's singing about Devonal and those two genuinely adore each other AND YET SO MANY PEOPLE CAN'T SEE THAT IN A PURE SENSE. Because they're two guys, people assume they're gay, and then assume they're being licentious, promiscuous, immoral. NOPE. NOPE AND NEVER EVER, NO HOW.
But that's what makes me so angry. S ALSO jumped on the illicit and utterly disgusting idea that Justice & Revenge were INCESTUOUS??? And they were OBSESSED with it. And NOW Revenge's basic SELF has been SHATTERED in the League and I can feel it frantically trying to rebuild him but it doesn't know HOW because those corruptive imposed ideas got too deeply ingrained in there and things need to be ripped up and COMPLETELY rewritten but God I can't do that to my own life.

I can't rip up and rebuild. I'm stuck carrying this timeline.
But… there's the bit, the one tiny crack in my armor where the light gets in, the fracture straight above my heart, that says "if the only way I could protect the love I've known is by carrying that agony as well, then I will carry it until I die."
And that's Jay's voice.
And that makes me want to cry.

I want to be Jay again. I want to be whatever he was that made him so pure and loving and good. He was just… incandescent. He was iridescent. He was JOY, and he was only that because he was also LOVE.

…Can I even be that? How?



Hey! Here's another sudden thought.
I can GIVE love, at least conceptually, in imagining third person images of myself, BUT! I cannot imagine myself RECEIVING love. Like, the idea of someone looking at ME, or kissing me, is genuinely TERRIFYING and makes me want to run and hide and cry like a panicked child, shaking and confused and so, so, so sad. And that is obviously trauma residue.


Here's an interesting thought.
There are very few people in the League or in the Spectrum who can hold intimacy, or rather, raw emotion. Like, there are very few people who can be stripped down to bare their heart and blood and wounds and still stand. Lots of folks are too scared, too hardened, too afraid, et cetera. But some of them aren't. And those people are the ones who can look at you with eyes that are just like… holy fire. Untouchable, unbreakable, undying… but so bright. It's not a hard light. It's bright, so bright, but it's somehow so soft. It's fierce but it's tender. And those words are terrifying to someone like me who, currently, cannot bare their wounds because they are too awful. But some people… the sort of person I want and need to be… the sort of person that, honestly, hopefully, gloriously, anyone can become, God's grace willing… some people-- like Jesus, quite blatantly-- can have their hearts torn open and they will STILL gently wear those scars and let you TOUCH them. That sort of absolute invincible tenderness is staggering. And, as Jay, I used to be like that. I need to be like that again.
Chaos Zero is like that. Honestly, he is the MOST like that of anyone I have EVER known. In my entire life I don't think I have EVER seen him closed off. If he tries, he melts almost immediately. Really, it's utterly against his very nature to have a closed heart. And I love that about him. I love him. And honestly… he deserves to be with someone like him in that sense. To say otherwise would be cruelty. You cannot pair up such a raw heart with a hard one. If I want to be with him-- and I do, God knows I do, to have and to hold, in sickness and in health, in the darkest of times, in the face of death even-- I do, I do want to be with him but my heart has to melt like his first.
Or it needs to be set on fire.

What is my personal element, now? Oh geez maybe THAT'S the issue????
The Jewel bloodline has always been fire. But Jewel, infamously, was somehow NEVER able to be soft like Jay. It's shocking. Jay's element was snow and LIGHT. Sparkles and softness and purity and white joy.
If I… if I redefine myself, if I maybe even start a new bloodline, find a new name… maybe I can soften? Maybe this weird brown-haired stone-heart earth-shackled girl I feel damned to be can change, can essentially redefine herself by what her soul is, truly, I know. I am not this reflection. I am what God created me to be and that is a child of God and that is someone who loves and rejoices and shines HIS Light through her life. And I cannot do that if I'm an inert pebble here.
I need to be light and snowflakes again. I need to find a new name.

So there we go, that's thoughts for today. It's almost noon and that thunderstorm is still rolling in and hey, maybe instead of panicking over it I'll bravely bare my heart a little and ask Laurie to join me in watching that beautiful powerful act of God outside. Lightning like her. Thunder like her words in my heart. Rain like my beloved's tears. All three of us, Genesis too with the wind, and then what am I?
"You're the hope that ties it all together," I feel her say. "You're the rainbow after the storm. You're the hope of sunshine when it's all over."
"But I don't want it to be all over," I say, a real twinge of loving sadness pulling at my chest like a guzheng string, pulling it into a vibrato. "Not if it's you. Even if it's scary, if it's you, I want it to stay."
"Even if you're scared?" A knowing voice. A hint of a purple smile.
"Yeah." I mean it, despite my trembling hands.
"And why is that?"
"…because I love you."
"And there you go," she says, throwing her own hands open in a victorious gesture, smiling, looking away a little, as if it was too bright a feeling to bear head-on. "There you go. That's how you get through this. Love."
And she looks right at me.
"You hold on to that, kid. No matter what. Promise me you will."
I nod.
"I'm still scared."
"'Course you're still scared, you're afraid to look love in the face. Embrace it, kid. Even if it hurts. Even if it's a crown of thorns. You've gotta hold it to your heart or it's not gonna carry you through the storm."


Be my light to others, child.
God is love, and love is God, and love is light unending, undefeatable.
There is always a sun behind the clouds, even in the worst of storms.
Fear not. I am with you always.
I love you too.

The reason why we are supposed to love our enemies and act like Christ even to the on godly is because only God can convert souls and only by imitating Christ can we bring presence of Christ to others, therefore allowing him to convert them!  If we act in evil or selfishly than we are not bringing any of Christ's presence into their presence, And as a result no good is accomplished on either side. Again we must bring Christ to others in order for their hearts to receive Christ.


Eucharistic Adoration-- His Heart IS His Face; His Face shows us HIS HEART; to recognize Jesus is to see BOTH AS ONE, and in Adoration it is all we CAN SEE. That is MONUMENTAL

“The other day, a man, a journalist, asked me a strange question. He asked me, “Even you, do you have to go to confession?” I said, “Yes, I go to con­fession every week.” And he said, “Then God must be very demanding if you have to go to confession.” And I said, “Your own child sometimes does some­thing wrong. What happens when your child comes to you and says, ‘Daddy, I’m sorry’? What do you do? You put both of your arms around your child and kiss him. Why? Because that’s your way of telling him that you love him. God does the same thing. He loves you tenderly.” Even when we sin or make a mistake, let’s allow that to help us grow closer to God. Let’s tell Him humbly, “I know I shouldn’t have done this, but even this failure I offer to you.” If we have sinned or made a mistake, let us go to Him and say, “I’m sorry! I repent.” God is a forgiving Father. His mercy is greater than our sins. He will forgive us.”

— Saint Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997), founder of the Missionary Sisters of Charity
No Greater Love

“Even this failure I offer to you.” That struck my heart so strongly.

It is a gesture of radically surrendering love to offer even our humiliating weaknesses to our Father, hiding nothing, withholding nothing, giving Him literally everything we have, for Him to use as He will. If we do that, we will inevitably grow close to Him, for we are not letting anything come between us.

Always repent, and always confess, as swiftly and sincerely as possible. Always say you’re sorry, and run to your Father’s loving heart, where you will find both the mercy and forgiveness you desperately need, and the strength and compassion to keep trying to live even more lovingly in return.

“She saw the limitations of all her efforts. She remained small and very far off from the unfailing love that she would wish to practice. She understood then that it was on this very littleness that she must lean to ask God’s help.”

—St. Therese Church, Alhambra, CA Website

…I’m beginning to finally understand why Saint Therese is so beloved.

I feel this same way, dearest sister, unbearably so. Pray for me, that I too may surrender my fear of uselessness and instead run to God Our Father, leaning on Him, letting Him use my littleness as littleness for His Great Purposes. It is only through Him that I can achieve anything at all, and if He so uses me, then even the most seemingly insignificant action becomes profoundly blessed through His Power.

Dear Saint Therese, little flower, pray for us, your fellow tiny blooms in God’s garden, that we may learn from you how to love and trust and serve God ever more deeply, no matter how useless we may feel, for God always has a beautifully perfect use for everything.

 

mysticismmess: Having a plague during lent is so medieval I love

celtic-pyro: Now EVERYONE is making sacrifices.
 

“Come back to me with all your heart, fasting, weeping, mourning. Let your hearts be broken, not your garments torn, turn to the Lord your God again, for he is all tenderness and compassion, slow to anger, rich in graciousness, and ready to relent.” (Joel 2:12-13)

Honestly I see God’s terrible and wonderful Hand in even this, as an act of both chastisement and mercy. Penance and repentance are desperately needed in our fallen world, for the good of our souls, and this virus scare is a powerful impetus to bring about both.

If we accept this time as such, with unshakable faith in Him, then no matter what happens, He will use it all for the good of our souls. All glory and gratitude be to our Sovereign Loving Lord.

 

smol-catholic-bean: Dioceses shouldn’t be canceling Masses. If anything they should be creating more Mass times so people have more options and are more spread out. Anyone else agree?

 

Absolutely. A church IS an essential service in society– arguably THE essential service, at the heart of things. Yes, our bodies need food, but so do our souls, and we Must remember this, Especially in such times of mortal crisis.

I heard that some churches are indeed celebrating multiple masses per day, in order to keep attendance low (10-15 folks or so, I’d assume) without depriving anyone. I would love to see this nationwide. Priests should be profoundly grateful for this opportunity to offer an extra, deeply sanctifying sacrifice of time and effort for such a vital cause. And people should follow suit, realizing in the face of threatened deprivation, just how indispensable the Mass is in their lives, and making the effort to devotedly attend not just now, but forever after.

Nevertheless, even if we cannot attend a Mass right now, they ARE occurring and we must attend them spiritually. We must pray, we must do penance, we must act with charity, we must LIVE the essence of the Mass– because we ARE the Body of Christ, through Him and with Him and in Him, even if we cannot currently receive the Most Holy Eucharist to literally manifest that mysterious truth. We must let our hunger for God during this time of notable fasting, both physical and spiritual, motivate us to seek and pursue and adore Him all the more in His immediate ‘absence,’ driven by indefatigable hope, so that when He does return to us– in whatever sense– we will not take Him for granted, but run to embrace Him with tearful ardor and gratitude, relief and joy, living our restored lives with a new and driving sense of faith and love.

The short answer, though? Yes, more masses. We need them now more than ever.

“There’s one thing we need above everything else; It’s something we don’t talk about these days. We need a mighty avalanche of conviction of sin.”
-Leonard Ravenhill
 

It’s the first solid step in truly surrendering one’s life to Christ, and as such it is VITAL. Without a genuine conviction of sin, you cannot genuinely accept a Savior. And without Christ, we are lost!

Christ is our greatest need– therefore, the humbling heartbreak of contrition that drives us TO Him in earnest is, just as much, a need.

“You shouldn’t want to do things to gain merit, nor out of fear of the punishments of Purgatory. From now on, and always, you should make the effort to do everything, even the smallest things, to please Jesus.”

— St. Josemaria Escriva

Our hearts and motives are only pure when they are anchored and focused solely on serving God out of love, as simply and joyously as a child doting on a beloved parent. Any motives of fear, gain, loss, reward, or selfishness in any sense are impure as they are not oriented towards God. And this does sadden Him! Please, always examine your heart about this and pray for the grace to surrender all self-interest and give everything to God out of love. Trust Him; He will take care of the details. ❤

“Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.” (1 Corinthians 10:31 KJV)

“Anything that does not lead you to God is a hindrance. Root it out and throw it far from you.”

— St. Josemaria Escriva

No exceptions, no excuses. We’re the Church Militant– this is a war against sin, and we cannot afford to be so hindered! Indeed, the more we grow to love God, the more unbearable such hindrances will become, as they are keeping us away from our Beloved.

If you are scared, hesitant, or unsure, ask the Holy Spirit for help in both discernment and courage. He will help you; He wants to throw out those obstacles even more than you do!

“Love for the Roman Pontiff must be in us a delightful passion, for in him we see Christ.”

— Josemaria Escriva, In Love with the Church, 13

We must love all people for this same reason, but yes, the Pope does have a sacred inheritance directly from the hands of Christ, and therefore his mirroring of Our Lord must be at the forefront of our hearts when obeying and respecting him. The Pope is not Christ, nor are we, but every Christian worth his salt should still love him with a special enthusiasm, seeing Jesus echoed in him in a unique and powerful way.

Describing our love of Christ in others as a “delightful passion” is really beautiful and moving in any case. After all, it is only through loving them that we can love Christ directly in this physical world. Remember that, and live it ardently.

“Purgatory shows God’s great mercy and washes away the defects of those who long to become one with Him.”

— St. Josemaria Escriva

The revelation of Purgatory has always been such a huge source of gratitude and hope for my soul. As a struggling sinner, I know my soul desperately needs purification in a literal sense before I can step into heaven. I want this. And Purgatory accomplishes this. It is, indeed, a showing of deepest mercy by our loving God.

Pray for those souls always!

“A task which presents no difficulties lacks human appeal - and supernatural appeal too. If you find no resistance when hammering a nail into a wall, what can you expect to hang on it?”

— St. Josemaría Escrivá

If you ever find a “nail” in your life too difficult to hammer home, just ask The Carpenter Himself– our dear Jesus Christ. Believe me, no one ever had to deal with nails more difficult than He did.

“God is here, This truth should fill our lives, and every Christmas should be for us a new and special meeting with God, when we allow His light and grace to enter deep into our soul.”

— St. Josemaria Escriva, Christ is Passing By

Christmas is such a deeply sacred and jubilant holiday for this very reason– a reason which surpasses all others. God is here! We cannot imagine anything more glorious, life-changing, or all-encompassing. God is with us now, and every celebration of His nativity should indeed bring fresh joy, hope, wonder, inspiration, and grace.

But it should never cease after Christmas, nor should it only begin there! The manger continues to exist in our hearts, awaiting His blessed birth daily, allowing us to meet Him brand-new and beautiful in every moment, every encounter, every prayer. Christmas is absolutely the time to let special snowdrift-deep grace and light and truth fill our souls, but don’t forget that the little Child in the cold continued to live and grow into the warmth of summer and beyond. But we don’t see His childhood, do we, even in the Bible. It’s a mystery, something hidden yet believed, a fact that nevertheless gives no details. But He is here, still, learning and laughing and loving us just the same.

And so, even if the Child stays a secret as the weather warms, the triumphant truth of Christmas should still fill our lives with His Presence year-round, sustaining us with its gorgeous reality of generous grace… until the snow returns with its pure white promise and we can once again meet Him and see Him and touch Him who our hearts have long and lovingly held in hope.

"Your job is not to judge. Your job is not to figure out if someone deserves something. Your job is to lift the fallen, to restore the broken, and to heal the hurting."

First, let me say that only God can decide who will or will not be damned. No human has the authority or knowledge or understanding to make such a judgment. Hell exists, and God can, will, and has sent people there. These are truths that we must accept at their most raw.

Even so...

God is the only Judge, for He alone is just, righteous, wise, and pure. His Love will be the final say in all things. But this judgment is moral, and spiritual. Here on earth, living our mortal lives, God forbids us from judging as it is not, and never can be, our job.

Our job is to love. Our job is to minister to others, ALL others, without exception or prejudice. “Deserve” is a dirty word that mocks charity and mercy. Love counts no cost, nor does it even calculate one. Love simply gives, boundlessly and with sincere dedication, driven by courage and enthusiasm and zealous compassion, its only motive and goal being love itself– love of God and love of neighbor, at any cost, with any sacrifice. Love never stops; Love never runs; Love never ends.

If your neighbor trips, stumbles, falls, or collapses, help them up with a strong hand and loving heart, and if they need further help to stand or walk, continue to help them with utmost gentleness.

If your neighbor is damaged, cracked, bruised, fragile, or broken to pieces, help them mend with patience, tenderness and an open heart, remembering that broken pieces may both bleed and cut, handling each fragment with care and sincere compassion.

If your neighbor is hurting in any way– physically, emotionally, spiritually, mentally, financially, morally, creatively, et cetera– help them heal by soothing that ache however you can, even if you can only offer a bandage, a hug, a prayer, a listening ear, a dollar bill, a gentle correction, a word of inspiration… whatever you can give, whatever you have, give it. If all you have is a song, then sing with all the love in your heart. Put your hands to mending and holding and carrying and guiding and reaching out. Put your feet to rescuing and delivering and pursuing and working for the benefit of all. Put your mind to good thoughts to motivate and move you, put your mouth to good words to motivate and move others. In all things, love without limit. In all things, find the pain and kiss it better. In every human encounter, ask what they need and give all you can supply. Do it all with love.

This is the call of every Christian. This is what it means to imitate Christ. He, the Divine Physician, came to not only call sinners, but also to forgive and heal them. He came to minister to the sick and feeble, He came to cure our ills and infirmities, He was born to deliver us from death. He IS Love, and if we are in Him, then we will bring His Love to the world. We, too, will become healers and helpers to all peoples. We, too, will– indeed, we must– become Love in action.

There are infinite ways to serve others in every moment, and Love is just as infinite, for it is never diminished by the smallness of an action. You can help someone right now. You can love someone right now. You can help heal someone right now. This is the blessed reality of life, the silver lining of suffering– in the face of darkness, light shines all the more triumphantly, and its power is felt all the more strongly. You can be a candle of Love’s fire, a mirror of divine Light right now… even just with a sincere smile, a kind hello, or a loving thought. It all matters. It all makes a difference.

Rejoice, and do it!

Genesis 27:3 =
"The fact that the prophet asks Esau for food by giving him an order signifies the call that the Word addresses to the first people when he asks them for the fruit of the works of justice, that justice which was considered to be a nourishment for the Father. In fact, the words “go out to the field, and hunt game for me” signify worldly life." (Hippolytus of Rome)

⭐THE "FOOD OF GOD" IS JUSTICE!!!

Reflect on this in context; unlike Isaac, God is all powerful and can "feed Himself" so to speak? (This is said somewhere.)... HOWEVER??? He cannot "harvest His own fruit" in a sense?? And WANTS to need us to get it for Him, and feed Him? FATHERS LOVE BEING FED BY THEIR KIDS, JUST TO DELIGHT IN THAT LOVE. And vice versa.

⭐"I THIRST" + "GIVE ME A DRINK" etc.!!

"...The people, inflated with their personal glory, would not be justified by their faith but by being proud of their wars would ask for a tyrant as their king." (Hippolytus of Rome)

⭐TOO PROUD to LET themselves be justified by faith!!! That requires ADMISSION OF HELPLESSNESS AND TOTAL POWERLESSNESS TO JUSTIFY ONESELF. So part of why people deny Christ's Atonement is that they seek their own glory? Must instead be like a child-- "I cant do it, I have to have Dad help me" and THEN thank Him UNRESERVEDLY, in total acknowledgement that "Dad" did ALL the work, and REJOICING IN THAT. Even showing off "look what my Dad did for me"-- NO SHAME in the personal inability this reveals; no, the child "GLORIFIES IN WEAKNESS" precisely because it glorifies his Father!!!

"If ye love Me, keep My Commandments." (John 14:15)

So simple, yet so vital.
To walk in our Lord’s footsteps, we must keep His commandments, which are basically this: to love God with every atom of our being, and to show that same love to our neighbor for His sake. Effectively, Jesus calls us– insists, truly– to let our love of God permeate everything we do, seeking justice & mercy, peace & truth, compassion & charity, service & sacrifice at all times, just like He did, in obedience to His Father.
A child that loves their parents obeys them not out of generic duty, but he obeys them because he loves them and truly delights to see them happy and pleased with his obedience, and with his extra acts of love and affection, which will inevitably occur in such an obedient heart. So must we also be.
Let us be children, running after our Lord in the sand, so enraptured with love of Him that our single concern is keeping up, getting closer, letting our footprints fall into His as much as we can, and delighting in feeling the imprint of His blessed feet with each step!

“One day I expressed surprise that God does not give an equal amount of glory to all the elect in Heaven. I was afraid that they would not all be quite happy. She [her sister Pauline] sent me to fetch Papa’s big tumbler, and put it beside my tiny thimble, then, filling both with water, she asked me which seemed the fuller. I replied that one was as full as the other it was impossible to pour more water into either of them, for they could not hold it. In this way, Pauline made it clear to me that in Heaven, the least of the Blessed does not envy the happiness of the greatest; and so, by bringing the highest mysteries down to the level of my understanding, she gave my soul the food it needed.”

— Story of a Soul

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the differing levels of glory given to the saints in heaven, and honesty getting very distraught over the thought that I’d only ever be a thimble, if even that, if God was merciful enough to even let me in to heaven at all. And it’s not about envy or pride, no. At heart it’s a mourning, that I felt I could never be a pitcher of water for God, that my heart’s aching yearning to both fill itself with Him and pour itself out for Him was doomed by my illnesses and faults, tragically hampered by my weaknesses to the point where I could never be as close to Him as I wanted, that I’d never be able to glorify Him even on earth as much as He deserved and I honestly desired. And it’s been an unbearable thought.
Yes, it’s a motivation. It’s a desperate drive. It’s making me strive ever harder to make my heart grow in love, emptying out as much extraneous junk as I can to fit more of God in my life. Yet that fear stays. Will I ever feel close enough to God? Will I ever be able to praise Him as fervently as I wish? Will I be miserable in heaven– an impossibility, truly, but still– because I will see what I could have become for our Lord, and through my failures, didn’t?
This tiny story from Saint Thérèse calms my soul substantially. “One was as full as the other,” never less than completely, and yet never “too much.” What we cannot hold, He will not force on us, yet we will be nevertheless full to the brim. That’s a comfort. And I doubt our good Lord would judge me for being a thimble rather than a pitcher, if my thimble-ness still pleased Him by offering its entire self up for Him even so.
I want to be a pitcher of water. Heck, God knows I’d love to be an entire bathtub full in comparison if I could hold so much of Him. But if I cannot– honestly, if my poor battered brain and body cannot hold so much holy water without bursting and breaking from structural faults– then I must remember that my dear Savior will then pick up my poor tiny thimble of a soul and, with the utmost tenderness and love, fill me with His love to the very last drop I can possibly carry. And He will be delighted.

"Prayer is a remedy for Sorrow and despondency.” (Saint Neilos the Ascetic)

It truly is. Prayer immediately lifts our hearts & minds, our affections & thoughts, to God, Who is good, faithful, true, just, merciful, and loving. Despondency and sorrow disappear in the light of prayer, for the nearness of God in our communication with Him soothes every fear.

"When you kneel before an altar, do it in such a way that others may be able to recognize that you know before whom you kneel" (Saint Maximilian Kolbe)

I think about this constantly; it applies to public life too! Make the sign of the Cross when passing a church. Bow to every crucifix. Treat all sacramentals with respect. Your love of Christ must be evident and active in all aspects of your life; but yes, Especially at Mass!

"The most important miracle to be sought for in prayer is the union of our whole being with God-- 'that good part, which shall not be taken away' (Luke 10:42) from us by death." (Archmandrite Sophrony)

We hope to achieve the Beatific Vision after we die, so it only makes spiritual sense to seek to grow, through the grace of prayer, as close as we possibly can to that heavenly finality while we still live on earth and progress towards that death.

prosperosfootnotes: Tradition, Canon Law, and good sense all agree that you’re exempt from fasting for health reasons; try adopting a new spiritual discipline instead!

I’m 30 years old and 87 pounds. I fasted for 18 hours today before I nearly passed out and I felt awful but I HAD to eat a full meal. I would absolutely love to fast hardcore for Lent but even my parish priest expressly forbade me to, again, for obvious health reasons. However. Why do we fast during Lent? To mortify our flesh, to practice self-denial and sacrifice, to focus more completely on God, to dedicate more of our time and effort to religion and not worldly ritual… the list goes on. But if you cannot fast from food in the traditional sense, you can STILL FAST in other ways as long as all your fasts achieve this greater purpose!
Lent is a holy desert bringing us closer to Christ, but no one is obligated to put their life at risk by doing so, especially not if that will make it even harder for you to truly serve God– after all, if you’re too sick to even stand up from not eating, you can’t do the charity work you otherwise could have, etc. So be prudent and merciful as well as devoted and willing to sacrifice whatever you can. God knows your heart. Have a blessed Lent. 💜

Can't live on lettuce; too rough. Shaky weak again. Remember old days.

Don't want to be sick. LEGIT.

Too much to do for God! Must strive for a holy death.

Music performance CAN'T properly replace it yet?

Eating is weirdly INTENSELY PERSONAL & intimate space.

I think I'm using it as a way of self-isolating for calming? Need this intense privacy BUT scared to be legit alone. So a compromise. The grossness of eating guarantees being left alone.

BUT although music is THE MOST INTIMATE, it invites an audience. And right now my psyche needs alone time?

Phone cannot replace food-- it causes reality detachment. So do computers. Weirdly my brain actually WANTS to be present in the physical for once in my life.

HOW MUCH OF THIS IS TRAUMA RECOVERY AND/OR IMITATION FROM CHARLOTTE???


REMEMBER = becoming holy doesnt make the bad feelings and evil temptations go away; it just gives you the grace to SAY NO and RESIST THE DEVIL

Jesus, you are constantly coming to Your people, even when we fail to see You. In each and every moment that we are blessed to recognize You here and now, give us the courage to leap with joy at Your coming. Amen.

Gosh, this just made me realize– how many people failed to see, know, or recognize Christ while He was hidden in Mary’s womb! Remember that Saint Elizabeth and John the Baptist both felt His Presence assumedly before Mary even showed any notable signs of her divine pregnancy. Their hearts saw Him, recognized Him– what utter bliss! And yet… countless crowds passed Him and His mother by, knowing nothing of the world-changing miracle in their very midst.
O God, even now, You are all around us, hidden and yet clear as day to grace-filled hearts. We pray that we always recognize You and rejoice in that meeting. Open the eyes of our hearts, that we may celebrate the truth of Christmas every day!

“Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.” (Proverbs 19:21)
Today I challenge you to pray that God reveals His plan for your life to you.

And, once you pray, listen. Don’t block your ears. Don’t close your eyes. Listen, even if you’re scared. After all, God’s plan for your life might be the exact opposite of what you had planned for yourself, and it might demand more time, effort, finances, humility, inconveniences, sacrifices, change, upheaval, and general radical trust than you feel you can give or endure. But rest in this truth: God’s will for you is always what’s best for you, and He will carry you both to and through it, for His glory and good purpose.
So pray, listen, and then obey. Even if you start with just one tiny, shaky, frightened baby step, make that step with a fierce courage and trust in God regardless, and that timidity will rapidly melt away in the fire of divine love.
Oh, and a note of discernment– if it doesn’t glorify God, and if it doesn’t have love of God as it’s ultimate end and aim, then it’s not His will for your life. Remember this, because the devil will try to confuse and trick you every chance he gets.
God, your plans always prevail. Show me the way You want me to walk, and then graciously help me to do so!

"The seditious mob [at the U.S. Capital] was motivated... by an unholy amalgamation of white supremacy and Christianity."

This is deeply disturbing. TRUE Christianity has nothing to do with idolatrous violence, rage, & mayhem. The fact that Christianity in America has nevertheless become scandalized by such associations makes my heart sick. Please pray for the rioters and the politicians both. Also! You CAN be a baptized Christian and STILL be corrupt. Sin doesn't cancel out your religion-- otherwise Divine Mercy wouldn't be so amazing-- but sin DOES rot your soul, so that your religious affiliation is now a horrid scandal. Christ does NOT take this lightly. REPENT.

Remember that EVERYONE can potentially end up in hell OR heaven. Being a Christian does NOT make you "immune" or “incapable of doing wrong” even if you claim it's “for God." Newsflash: malformed consciences are a thing. Stop, read your Bible, and PRAY about it humbly. Love your enemies.

When the Bible says "do not lean on your own understanding," the Bible is being serious. Your heart is deceitful, your emotions fluctuate, your understanding does not see the overall, big picture. God never lies, God never changes, God knows all. Trust Him.

Humility demands that we actively and constantly acknowledge this. Our emotions, guesses, reasonings, perceptions, and imaginations are constantly falling short of truth, inevitably so. We are wrong and mistaken in our judgements so often it’s honestly laughable– and yet, we stubbornly (and fearfully) insist that “we know what we’re doing.” We really don’t, though. Only God does. And that’s the biggest relief, the most profound reassurance, the deepest peace– the fact that God cannot make mistakes.

So loosen your tight grip on life. Stop hypermanaging the details, stop insisting on your way or the highway. Stop being afraid of failure, and instead surrender every choice to your Father in heaven, who will never fail. Lean on Him like a trusting child, and He will carry you through it all.

Advertising tries to stimulate our sensuous desires, converting luxuries into necessities, but it only intensifies man’s inner misery. The business world is bent on creating hungers which its wares never satisfy, and thus it adds to the frustrations and broken minds of our times.

Archbishop Fulton Sheen, Lift Up Your Heart

The only way out of the beartrap of sensuality is to make up our minds, solemnly and honorably, to desire God alone. If we constantly check our cravings with this pledge, being brutally honest in our motives, then the Spirit will give us the grace to break the chains of luxury– sometimes link by link, but breaking free nevertheless.

Inner misery comes from one thing: seeking happiness in anything other than Christ. Once we humbly realize and admit this– and it does take serious humility to endure that shock of acknowledging our own corrupted desires and decisions– we can turn our hungering hearts to Him at last, all the more fully day by day, and finally experience the true and real joy in God that He’s wanted us to have all along.

Take a hard look at your life right now. Are you feeling hungry, miserable, unsatisfied, unfulfilled? When you feel that pang of luxury and want, turn to God. Remember that this life is temporary and only God is eternal. Look to the roots of your desperate clinging and ask yourself: what is it you truly want? It’s not things, it’s a feeling– the feeling of finally being happy, satisfied, fulfilled, at peace. But you haven’t yet truly acknowledged the fact that this world, being ruled by death, cannot ever give you those things. It’s a scary truth, yes… but only until you remember that God IS those Good Things, and will give them to the heart of those that turn to Him alone as the Source and Giver of them.

No matter what you may be desiring in life right now, God is greater, better, and more beautiful. God is ultimate fulfillment. Turn to Him!

“The crisis of nothingness is a summons to the everything which is God.”

— Archbishop Fulton Sheen, Three to Get Married

The raw experience of nothingness– of a sudden collapse into poverty, a scourge of disease, a loss of property, a death of a loved one– such a brutal and absolute encounter with emptiness and the utter inability of this world to satisfy the soul, let alone survive for long in its inevitable ephemerality… this awakens us to the truth. It’s a hard, sudden, shocking awakening, flinging us headlong into the abrupt acknowledgment of Light, only fully knowable now because we have been dragged from such depths of darkness. When we have honestly found ourselves at rock bottom, scrabbling at the dusty walls of a coal cellar, desperate to breathe now that the air is so thin– our tolerance of terror has been exhausted; we can no longer bear the awful weight of nothingness, the paradoxically crushing burden of now knowing, firsthand, that the way of the world is ultimately naught– then we helplessly turn our eyes upwards, desperate for a glimmer of something real, something untarnishable, something other than the fleeting pleasures and phenomena of the physical world. And of course Satan will do his darndest to lie to us in the most grandiose ways during this time, offering floodlights and banquets and golden decorations for our tomb, but none of it ever relieves that hollow feeling, that starvation for something more in a cosmic sense.

God is everything. God is the only “something,” the only real and beautiful and eternal thing. And no matter how long we may have been drowning in “nothing,” crushed under its terrible gravity, the moment we sincerely reach up to God He will take our hand and lift us higher. But how can we reach something– Someone– we do not acknowledge, let alone even know is there? Well, that’s the ironic beauty of it all. Falling into the debasing gutter of emptiness can slingshot us into the yearning for God’s boundless heavens better than anything else. God allows it for that very reason.

Are you currently in a crisis of nothingness? Are you experiencing, right now, the jarring and absolute revelation of just how fleeting the things of this world are? Are your finances failing, is your health declining, are your friends and family leaving, is your life falling apart? Then run to God, the only True and Lasting One, an impregnable stronghold, the very Source of all the peace and hope and light and life that your heart so desperately seeks and needs.

It is only through understanding what nothingness is, that we are able to know What nothingness isn’t.

“The Church is not a continuous phenomenon through history, rather, it is something that has been through a thousand Resurrections after a thousand crucifixions. The bell is always sounding for its execution which, by some great power of God, is everlastingly postponed.”

— Archbishop Fulton Sheen, Three to Get Married

I feel that, as God exists outside of time and therefore the Crucifixion and Resurrection are always occurring in a very real sense… it is only fitting that, as Christ’s Body, the Church in time would share in that perpetual dying and rising, always growing closer to God despite all odds, always both hanging on the Cross and rising from the tomb.

It’s something to meditate upon for sure.

heartcrymissionary:

My only resolution for this New Year - God is my first priority. I’ve run after people and I desired things. I’ve given importance to each and everything except God. And I’ve learned my lessons. Nothing is permanent and even though I got what I wanted, I’m not happy and there’s always a void or dissatisfaction. I can feel it in my heart that only God can satisfy my soul but I was pretty reluctant to obey him. But, God works in mysterious ways. He let me wander so that I personally experience the difference and now I’m the Prodigal Son who came back to his father. My God didn’t push me and he accepted me just the way I am. His Love is True. His Grace is so Deep. If you’re going through this phase, now is the time to start over. Come to Jesus. Start a New Life. Be Blessed. #ToNewBeginnings

I can echo this prayer so exactly it hurts… but what a paradoxically blissful pain it is, to now realize– quite powerfully– the truth that God is all I ever needed or will need.

No one is guaranteed tomorrow; every moment alive comes from God’s tender mercies. Therefore let us use every one of those moments for His glory, without procrastination, excuse, or timidity!

Let 2020 be the year that you, too, come fully home to God, that you begin to choose Him and His Truth over all else, that you seek Him first with no exceptions or excuses. Let 2020 be the first year of your new life in Christ, living in the unshakable joy of His Presence and spurning the empty entertainment of this fleeting world.

It’s never too late, as long as we are breathing, to return to God. He is always waiting for us with open arms and loving heart.
 

"For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions." (2 Timothy 4:3)

That time is now.

Furthermore, it’s disturbing how thoroughly those false teachers and itching ears can utterly blind a soul to the fact that they’re living in a “comfortable hell”– lounging in front of the TV while the world burns around them, as it were.

The pain of “enduring sound teaching” is a divine ache, a growing pain, an indication of pruning and healing and breaking out of chains. It’s like a child avoiding a vaccination because they’re afraid of the needle & pinch– understandable, true, but ultimately foolish and dangerous, for without that brief pain, they are at serious risk of suffering far greater pain, perhaps even death, as a result of disease.

Either you endure the blessed ache of conversion, or you numb yourself to the demands of holiness and end up burning later.

Do you want heaven, even if it hurts to get there, or would you rather just have your comfy chair and happy lies in hell?

Sweet Jesus, talking
   his melancholy madness,
     stood up in the boat
       and the sea lay down,

silky and sorry.
   So everybody was saved
      that night.
         But you know how it is

when something
    different crosses
       the threshold -- the uncles
          mutter together,

the women walk away,
   the young brother begins
      to sharpen his knife.
         Nobody knows what the soul is.

It comes and goes
   like the wind over the water --
      sometimes, for days,
        you don't think of it.

 Maybe, after the sermon,
   after the multitude was fed,
     one or two of them felt
       the soul slip forth

like a tremor of pure sunlight
   before exhaustion,
      that wants to swallow everything,
         gripped their bones and left them

miserable and sleepy,
    as they are now, forgetting
       how the wind tore at the sails
          before he rose and talked to it --

tender and luminous and demanding
   as he always was --
      a thousand times more frightening
         than the killer storm.

Mary Oliver, “Maybe,” from House of Light (1990)

The fear of God is wrapped up in the realization of Who and What God IS. To have seen that ageless and irresistible power manifest in Jesus– to see the wild terror of nature utterly collapse in obedience to Him– would have made any witness acutely aware of not only His divinity, but also of their own frailty, and the greater reality that encompassed them both.

Remembering Jesus makes it impossible to forget one’s soul– makes it impossible to ignore the truth of sin and mercy and judgment and life after death. Such a recollection can be honestly frightening, to a soul that has been asleep… and so the very reality of Jesus is indeed frightening as well.

The utter majesty of God is a thousand times more frightening than anything. And maybe no human ever can or will know what the soul is. But when we look at Jesus, we become so powerfully aware of both these things. And perhaps, the fact that such a being loves us, is frightening only in its initial incomprehensibility.

It’s this gorgeously dramatic paradox. The very God who both stirs up and silences the hurricanes and tidal waves of our lives, is the same God who yearns to wrap us in His arms with boundless love, even if it takes a typhoon to get us there.

But fear of God is rooted in reverence, and that reverence blooms into love, when we listen to Jesus tell us that this unfathomably great God is Our Father, through Him. This, too, carries a hugely fearful responsibility at first… which, like all else, melts away into love as we humbly admit our childlike helplessness before Him, and run to Him as such.

 

Devotion to Mary is simply giving her permission to form us into an image of Christ.

 

The simplicity of this profundity just floored me.

Mary, as our mother, then becomes to us who she literally only was to Jesus Christ. Calling her “mother” then puts us in the position OF her beloved Son, our Savior… and so she will joyfully raise us AS such.

It’s a staggering, humbling honor, a huge responsibility, and an unfathomable grace, to be able to not only grow closer to Christ in this way, but also to have such an opportunity of special intimacy with Him, under His mother’s care, her eyes recognizing Him in us and lovingly forming us into an ever-truer likeness of Him.

Mary was, and is, the mother of Christ. If we love Him, then devotion to her should follow suit.