204. Fourth Saturday of Ordinary Time
Meditations no. 83 (unofficial computer-aided translation)
The Work is a home.
The apostles returned to Jesus, and told him all that they had done and taught. And he said to them, âCome away by yourselves to a lonely place, and rest a while.â For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat. And they went away in the boat to a lonely place by themselves. Although expecting his disciples to work intensely and energetically, and to give up a number of rights and privileges, our Lord does not want them to be deprived of a home. He ensures that they are able to rest in a pleasant family environment. The same happens in the Work, which is concerned that her children should have the rest and relaxation they need.
Our vocation, my children, requires us to work intensely and cheerfully all our life. And with Godâs grace, we are all prepared to be heroic, whenever the service of God and souls so requires. But we need to be very human - I have already told you that, if we werenât, we couldnât be supernatural - and we should keep very much in mind that grace presupposes nature, and that God our Lord makes up for the lack of human means only when they cannot be had, because his providence ordinarily takes them into account.
God is a loving Father who doesnât want us to live out in the cold, exposed to the elements. We are not fighting alone: ours is not the sad struggle of a person abandoned by fortune, who never finds a helping hand or hears a word of encouragement. Who will trust a nimble robber that skips from city to city? So who will trust a man that has no home, and lodges wherever night finds him? We are children, and we have a family, a place of safety where we can regain our strength, so that we can set out on our way once more with renewed enthusiasm. Our home, the place God has given us for shelter and repose, is the Work itself, which lavishes affection and understanding on each of her children. The whole of Opus Dei is a home: one single home with one single cooking pot.
Wisdom has built her house, says Scripture. In our home we feel secure, and we recover our energies so that we can return to the struggle with new impetus. By Godâs will, the family life in our Centres plays an important role in our sanctification and our apostolic effectiveness. Consequently, no matter how many other things we have to do, we make sure we take special care of our family life. God gives us the warmth of a home as a means to our holiness, and we must make full use of it.
The Work is a boat sailing on the seas of the world. We are safe so long as we keep in the boat of the Work.
As it travels through the seas of this world, the Work leaves a trail of light in its wake. Duc in altum -put out into the deep - was the command we received from our Lord. And like Peter, we were obedient to his voice, and we set sail for those vast horizons where souls wait for us to come along with our nets. In our zeal for fish we cast the nets in all the seas before us.
We feel safe in this great ship where there is room for everyone. We are next to the Father, and surrounded by the others in the Work. The helmsman guides the ship with a firm hand through waters that are teeming with fish. Since it is Christ who is sending us out, we cast the nets in his name⌠and how many new vocations there will be! Each of us can already feel that sense of astonishment which the Apostles felt, when they drew in the nets.
A fisherman is someone well used to battling against the elements. He knows that the seas are not always going to be calm. There will be days of strong wind, and waves surging up and crashing against the boat. At times the blue sky will cloud over, or a thick mist may hide the broad horizons that had been visible on sunny days. Sometimes there will be not a breath of air to fill the sails, and the only way forward will be by the slow and weary process of rowing. The fisherman knows all this, and so do we. We know from our own experience all the different conditions we can go through in life: times when we feel the strong pull of temptation; times when we can no longer see the path we had been so enthusiastic about before; times of strange lethargy, when our hearts seem unmoved by the things of God.
We might experience all these things, but there is no cause for alarm. It will be the moment to commit ourselves even more resolutely to remaining in the boat, where the other members of the Work, and our Lord himself, will help us recover our calm and our supernatural outlook, and they will lovingly see to it that we rest. As our Founder wrote: We have to 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 Godâs grace ordinarily counts on our natural strength.
The boat will never sink. By the side of the Father and the others in our family of the Work, cor unum et anima una, with one heart and soul, we will be docile. And if a storm should rise up and disturb the waters, or if there are windless days that appear to slow down our progress, we will keep on rowing, without losing heart. Let us have no doubt about it: the sea will soon become calm once more; the blue skies will return; a steady, gentle breeze will blow, and carry us much further than we could ever have dreamed. And once more we will see the way, with Love awaiting us at the end.
The Work is our Mother. Filial trust.
The Work is more than a boat and a home. She is our Mother. She has a motherâs heart for her children, and cares for us with the sort of tenderness only a mother can give. She has immense love for us, and our response must be to show her the affection and loyalty of good children.
Remember that, no matter how many we come to be - and thank God, there are already many of us from every nation, race and tongue - we must never lose our family warmth. This is the Directorsâ responsibility; they must find room in their hearts for all the souls entrusted to them. They must know them all, one by one, and understand them, with their mistakes, their weaknesses and their errors (these words are not synonymous). They must also know their virtues and capabilities, and channel and direct them so that each one can give what God is asking.
Those who govern and form the others in the Work must share in all their rejoicing and their weeping. They must be so close to them that they feel afflicted in their own flesh at their sorrows and uplifted at their joys, accompanying them along the path of fidelity to the duties their vocation entails.
These words of our Father apply not only to the Directors, but to the rest of us as well. In the Work, everyone has to be in some measure a good shepherd to the others. I donât mind repeating it over and over again. Affection is something everyone needs, and we need it in the Work. Strive to ensure that, without silliness, your affection for the others always increases. Any concern of a child of mine should truly be something we feel very much as our own. The day we live as strangers or indifferent to one another, we will have killed Opus Dei.
As we proceed along the way, we may sometimes stumble and hurt ourselves. In the course of fighting the battles of God, we may sometimes be wounded. But if that were to happen, it shouldnât upset us, since we are human and we know how vulnerable we are. Nor would the Work be surprised at our weakness; rather, she would rush to help us and care for us even more. Itâs only natural that a good mother should go out of her way to look after the child who needs her most, the one who is ill or hurt, or the one who is youngest and weakest. All that is asked of the child is to turn to his mother; this too is filial love, because it is a proof of confidence.
What would be hard to understand is a child concealing its wounds or its illness, or secretly going in search of someone unqualified to deal with its injuries. Anyone who did that would be a madman, not a good child, and would end up in a bad way. The Directors love us, and understand us. Let us always go to them, since they are the Good Shepherd for us. Let us be convinced that they will provide us with the remedy we need. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. The trust we show them is the best proof of our loyal affection for this Mother of ours. It is the way we can faithfully repay her great love for us.
A mother, a home, a boat: the Work is all those things for us. With love and gratitude, we tell Jesus: Lord, I find myself here in this great net, in this great boat which is Opus Dei. By your grace and the aid of our heavenly Mother, I will let the Directorsâ hands mould me and make me strong, sturdy, effective and attractive in your sight. Then I will truly have the clean, supernatural blood of our family coursing through my whole interior life and external work.