129. Second Thursday of Easter

Meditations no. 175 (unofficial computer-aided translation)

The apostle’s mission demands personal sacrifice.

During these days, the Book of the Acts of the Apostles describes the growth of the early Church and the persecution which arose in Jerusalem through the Jews’ envy. After putting the Apostles into prison, they set them before the council. And the high priest questioned them, saying: “We strictly charged you not to teach in this name, yet here you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and you intend to bring this man’s blood upon us.” But Peter and the apostles answered: “We must obey God rather than men.”… When they heard this, they were enraged and wanted to kill them.

Today, as always, the Christian faith finds obstacles along its way. For while she is on earth, the Church, “like a pilgrim in a foreign land, presses forward amid the persecutions of the world and the consolations of God,” announcing the Cross and Death of the Lord until he comes. By the power of the risen Lord she is given strength to overcome patiently and lovingly the afflictions and hardships which assail her from within and without, and to show forth in the world the mystery of the Lord in a faithful though shadowed way, until at the last it will be revealed in total splendour.

Jesus had announced that in the world his followers would have tribulation. How well his first disciples learned the Master’s lesson! The Acts of the Apostles tells how they overcame all kinds of difficulties and dangers in order to carry out the mission entrusted to them by our Lord. They were convinced that just as Christ bought souls at the price of his own blood, in like manner, the Apostles whom he chose were sent into the world not to enjoy but to suffer, St Paul tells us plainly: I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation which in Christ Jesus goes with eternal glory. And he adds with joy: Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the Church,

Without personal sacrifice there will be no fruit. The Cross is present in everything and it comes when one least expects it. But don’t forget that normally, the Cross comes when you start to be effective.

Self-giving and the renunciation of all personal ambitions, for the sake of the apostolate.

Dearly beloved daughters and sons, you are here in the Work because our Lord has placed in your hearts a pure and generous desire to serve, a true zeal that makes you willing to undertake any sacrifice, as you work away quietly for the Church without seeking any earthly compensation. Fill yourselves with these noble ambitions, and strengthen this holy disposition in your hearts, because there is an immense amount of work to be done.

We have to ask God our Lord to increase our hunger to serve. For messis quidem multa, operarii autem pauci. The labourers are few, and the harvest plentiful. Our apostolate is a sea without shores, and there are so few souls in the world who want to serve God! Imagine what would happen if those of us who are willing to serve were to be half-hearted about it.

Once and for all, we need to get rid of whatever separates us from, or even slightly hinders, our way as apostles. I did not shrink from anything that was profitable for you, says St Paul to the faithful at Ephesus. We should be able to say the same thing to the souls whose salvation may depend on our self-giving. We can never forget that only when apostles are ready to sacrifice their own lives, through continuous self-denial in the service of others for God, will they be truly united to Jesus’ work of redemption. Only then can their apostolate be fruitful.

Far from discouraging us, the difficulties we meet have to spur us on to mature as Christians. This fight sanctifies us and gives effectiveness to our apostolic endeavours … We must be convinced that in order to imitate Christ, and be good disciples of his, we must take his advice to heart: If any man has a mind to come my way, let him renounce self, and take up his cross, and follow me. That is why I like to ask Jesus, for myself: Lord, no day without a Cross! Then, through God’s grace, our characters will grow strong and we will become a point of support for our God, over and above our own wretchedness.

Take a nail for instance. If you meet no resistance when you hammer it into a wall, what can you expect to hang on it? Likewise, if we do not let God toughen us through sacrifice, we will never become our Lord’s instruments. On the other hand, if we decide to accept difficulties gladly and make use of them for the love of God, then in the face of what is difficult and unpleasant, when things are hard and uncomfortable, we will be able to exclaim with the Apostles James and John: Possumus! Yes, we can!

Apostolate is service and can only be service.

Our Father wrote: You have not come to the Work to seek anything. You have come to give yourselves, to renounce all personal ambition for love of God. Everyone has to leave something if they want to be effective in the Work, and work as God asks us to, like a faithful donkey, ut iumentum! The donkey’s only ambition is to serve, to be useful; and the only reward he looks for is the one God has promised: Quia tu reddes unicuique iuxta opera sua, for the Lord rewards each according to their works.

Let us serve, then, because apostolate consists of nothing else. Through our own efforts we cannot achieve anything in the supernatural realm; but by allowing ourselves to become God’s instruments, we can do everything: Omnia possum in eo qui me confortat! I can do all things in him who strengthens me, because he has chosen, in his goodness, to make use of such clumsy instruments. Thus, we apostles have no other goal than that of allowing our Lord to work through us, making ourselves available so that God can carry out his saving work, through his creatures, his chosen ones.

Apostles are Christians who know that they are grafted onto Christ, identified with Christ, through Baptism; enabled to fight for Christ, through Confirmation; called to serve God with their activity in the world, through their participation in the royal, prophetic and priestly functions of Christ, which enable them to guide others to God, to teach them the truth of the Gospel, and to co-redeem them through their prayer and their expiation.

Christians who are ready to serve are guides, teachers and priests to other people; they are, for those people, other Christs, alter Christus, or rather, as I usually say to you, ipse Christus (Christ himself). But I insist, it’s not a matter of doing our own thing, of fulfilling our personal ambitions. Rather, it’s a matter of being useful to Christ, so that he may act; and also, being useful to others, because Christ came not to be served but to serve: non venit ministrari, sed ministrare.

In the light of these considerations, let us examine the spirit of service in which we carry out the apostolate entrusted to us by the Directors; the joy with which we accept difficulties and setbacks; and the dispositions with which we receive new assignments or leave those we have, as the case may be.

Let us ask our Mother, the universal Co-redemptrix, in union with Jesus Christ, to help us rid ourselves of all resistance to personal sacrifice, so that there may be abundant fruit in our apostolate.