176. First Friday of Ordinary Time

Meditations no. 61 (unofficial computer-aided translation)

The duty of looking after our health in order to serve God.

We have to work hard in the service of souls. Therefore we need to be fit, so that we can go on working, and so that God can continue to place loads on our shoulders. Life is a gift from God, which we want to spend completely in his service. And the same goes for our health. As we read in the book of Sirach: Health and soundness are better than all gold, and a robust body than countless riches.

By divine command we are told to love God with all our strength. We want to love and serve him with all our faculties. As St Paul says: Lead a life worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. And we want to die of old age, after having spent our life in the service of love. Therefore good health is something to be appreciated. It allows us to toil in the Lord’s vineyard from the first hour of our vocation until the last, cheerfully bearing the burden of the day and the scorching heat. We try to stay healthy and strong, out of love for God and a desire to serve. But at the same time we avoid being over-concerned about the state of our health. And we obey all that we are told as regards looking after our health. Docility in this matter is part of our total dedication. Not even our body is ours; it belongs to God and is to be used solely for serving him.

Our Father recommends that we take special care to ensure that our body is always fit to respond as a good instrument of our soul. We should use all possible means to avoid anyone becoming physically exhausted as a result of work or other causes. Such physical exhaustion often leads to a psychological breakdown as well, and saps the vital energy which is necessary for the interior struggle. I remind you that God’s grace ordinarily counts on our natural strength.

We must look after ourselves in all the ways dictated by common sense. However, we are also called to exercise detachment as regards bodily health. If we fulfil the norms of prudence and nevertheless fall ill, then we offer that illness up to God. We are always ready to bear what he wants, with all endurance and patience with joy. In the end, it is God who is a guard against stumbling and a defence against falling. He lifts up the soul and gives light to the eyes; he grants healing, life, and blessing.

Accepting illness.

Besides taking care of ourselves we must also ask God for good health. St Augustine writes: If God knows that it is useful for you, he will grant it to you. If he does not give it to you, it is because it is better for you not to have it.

If God permits an illness - whether prolonged or merely passing - we must accept it and be thankful, because it is a means of purification. As St Gregory the Great says: Physical illness is very good for the health of the soul. Illness shows us our weakness and restores the soul; it purifies it from sins committed in the past, and keeps us from sins we could commit. Physical suffering makes us silent and patient, reminds us of our guilt, and draws our attention to all the evil we have done. And so, when we suffer in our body, we have even greater sorrow for our sins. Through the wound of the body, the hidden wound of the heart is purified all the more.

Our Father has given us the standard by which to judge physical suffering: You know what the approach is in the Work. When physical pain can be removed, it should be. There are enough sufferings in life! And when we cannot get rid of it, we offer it up.

We are thankful for the Cross, and we love it. It is there that the soul’s health and our resurrection are to be found. We know that if illness comes our way, it is because it is good for us. We have to receive it with the same love which we have for life. St Paul writes to the Philippians: It is my eager expectation and hope that I shall not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage now as always Christ will be honoured in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. God may sometimes choose to draw as much fruit from illness, and even from death, as he does from life and health: the fruit of a more purified holiness, abundant fruit of apostolate and proselytism. Therefore, just as we pray for health, so too we accept illness when it comes, and we make use of it in the service of God and souls, generously offering up everything it entails.

How to bear illness.

In the Work we cannot allow ourselves the luxury of being sick. What I ask of God is that he keeps me in good health until half an hour before I die. There is so much to be done; we need to be fit and well so that we can work for God. That is why you must look after yourselves, so that you die very old, squeezed out like a lemon, accepting God’s will as of now.

These words of our Father were written many years before God eventually called him to himself. The generous acceptance of illness involves a twofold abandonment: abandonment into the hands of God who sends the illness, and also abandonment to the care which the others in the Work lavish upon us, while we obey all they tell us.

In today’s Gospel we see a person who, without actually saying anything, gives us a very good lesson of the docility we should have when we are ill. That person is the paralytic from Capharnaum who is carried by his friends to Jesus. And when they could not get near him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him; and when they had made an opening, they let down the pallet on which the paralytic lay. The sick man did not offer any resistance, even when his friends came up with such a seemingly inappropriate plan. He knew they only wanted to help him, and he meekly abandoned himself into their hands.

When we are sick, what a marvellous opportunity it gives us of accepting all the care that the others offer us, doing whatever they tell us to do. And what a chance to be grateful for their love. They never hesitate to go out of their way to look after someone who is ill, since they know that that a sick person is the treasure of the house.

Children. The Sick. - As you write these words, don’t you feel tempted to write them with capitals? The reason is that in little children and in the sick a soul in love sees Him! As our Father always taught us: Although we are poor, our brothers and sisters will never lack what they need when they are ill. If necessary, we would steal a piece of heaven for them, and God would forgive us.

Illness is another chance to abandon and give ourselves. In all simplicity, we make our needs known, never forgetting that we are poor for the love of Christ, to whom we have given everything.

May our Lady, Salus infirmorum, Health of the Sick, and Consolatrix afflictorum, Comforter of the Afflicted, help us to bear with a joyful and docile spirit any illness we suffer. And may she ensure that it is always love for God that moves us to want to stay healthy, and to be generous in accepting God’s will when we fall ill.