292. Fourteenth Thursday of Ordinary Time

Meditations no. 274 (unofficial computer-aided translation)

The importance of the supernatural means.

Our Lord gathered his disciples and sent them to preach the kingdom of God throughout the villages of Israel, but before sending them on their way he gave them some instructions for the mission he was entrusting to them. Preach as you go, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without pay, give without pay. And to ensure that, right from the start, they would trust in God and rely exclusively on supernatural means, he continued: Take no gold, nor silver, nor copper in your belts, no bag for your journey, nor two tunics, nor sandals, nor a staff.

Their very lack of resources ensures that they learn to depend on Jesus to make their work fruitful; for, as St Gregory the Great says, the trust which the apostle puts in God has to be so great that, although he does not possess what he needs for daily living, he knows that he will never lack anything. They were to set out without any material means, so that it would be seen clearly that the success and the miracles didn’t spring from them, and that their own talents and efforts were not enough to bring sinners to do penance and prepare them to receive the kingdom of God.

This lesson in humility and supernatural outlook is something that will remain engraved on the disciples’ hearts, and they will preach the same to the Gentiles. In St Paul’s words: What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed … I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. As our Founder said: Our Lord seeks out unsuitable instruments so that people can see that it is he who is acting. When you are old you will see that God has used you as instruments - poor and insignificant as you are - to do great, heroic things.

In our apostolic work, the first means to employ is constant prayer, which should never be interrupted, and which should be accompanied by constant mortification - our own mortification, and that of the people we ask to help. If we lacked piety or were not continually attentive to our Lord, neither talent nor knowledge, no effort whatsoever, would suffice, for our Lord would leave us. Then we would go wrong, even in the most trivial things. Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labour in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil.

We should therefore take very much to heart our Father’s advice: Personal sanctity is a remedy for everything. That is why the saints have been full of peace, of fortitude, of joy, of security.

God wants us to use earthly resources too.

When they returned from their mission, the disciples were overjoyed and said to Christ: Even the demons are subject to us in your name. Sometime later, shortly before his Passion, Jesus reminded them of that first mission: “When I sent you out with no purse or bag or sandals, did you lack anything?” They said, “Nothing.” He said to them, “But now let him who has a purse take it, and likewise a bag.”

We have to understand this as meaning that we must also employ all the material resources we can muster. Our Father expressed it as follows: We are not angels, nor do we work with angels; and the apostolates of the Work are so extensive that we need a basic minimum of effective and useful means. A certain amount of financial support is needed to maintain our apostolates and create new ones. To act otherwise, banking on some miraculous delivery from our problems, is not the way God wants the Work to behave. In the words of our Founder: don’t ever look for extraordinary things in life: there is nothing more extraordinary than the ordinary Providence of our Father God.

Our need to use material resources also causes us to be humble, because it helps us realize just how insignificant our contribution is: we cannot explain the supernatural fruit simply on the basis of our own efforts. God blesses our puny contribution superabundantly. Work, work with optimism, was our Father’s rule. This is the great miracle we perform.

Our Lord asks us for the same effort that other people put into purely human affairs. As our Founder expressed it: Our work, the bonds of friendship and daily contact, our contribution to the welfare and progress of society side by side with our fellow citizens, are all, in the members of the Work, a natural fruit and logical consequence of that savour of Christ which comprises the life of the soul They are Christ’s work, Opus Dei, operatio Dei.

With a piety which is simple, straightforward and robust, and well assimilated, we purify the world around us. And without destroying it in any way, we turn it all into material for genuine sanctification and apostolate. I have often reminded you of the legend of King Midas, who turned everything he touched into gold. In a similar way, with our exclusively spiritual work of apostolate - aiming to serve mankind without making our work into an instrument of worldly influence - we sanctify from within, through the work of our minds and our hands, all the affairs and activities of this world.

Doing everything we can, while counting on God to give the growth.

We are carrying out a divine task: God’s Work. And we know well that what comes from us has no value: it is God who, in spite of our blunders, fills us with supernatural effectiveness. And so our Father was able to write: In the year 1940, on the beach at Valencia, I remember watching some tough, hardy fishermen dragging a net ashore. A small child had got in among them and, in his efforts to imitate them, was pulling on the net as well. He was only getting in the way, but the sight of him softened the hearts of those rough-mannered seafarers: they didn’t chase him away, but let him keep up his pretence of helping them in their efforts.

I have often told this story, because it moves me to think that God our Lord also allows us to lend a hand in his work. He is moved to compassion at the sight of our effort to collaborate with him: non quod sufficientes simus cogitare illiquid a nobis quasi ex nobis, sed sufficientia nostra ex Deo est: not that we are sufficient of ourselves to claim anything as coming from us; our sufficiency is from God. God treats us as a father treats his child. He asks for our cooperation, just so that he can let us share the fruits which he alone has produced. But he does want our cooperation: he wants us to give him that sign of our love.

If therefore our work is not fruitful, we cannot throw the blame on some external difficulty. If our examination of conscience is truly sincere we will have to admit that our lack of effectiveness is due to our not having used all the supernatural and human means at our disposal.

Speaking about apostolate and winning new apostles, our Father frequently commented: Anybody who works at getting vocations, will get them. If he only does a little he will get few; if he does a lot he will get many. If there are no vocations it’s a sign of lack of love of God. If we really love God, if we make use of all the supernatural and natural means - prayer, mortification, and grasping every opportunity - God will see to it that our efforts are not in vain. As our Founder put it, the means we should always use are: a life of prayer, a life of sacrifice, and the fulfilment of our duty at work and in social life.

If we ever realize that we have been negligent, let us turn to our Blessed Lady for help, mindful of our Father’s words: Have recourse to the Blessed Virgin every day with complete confidence. Your soul and your life will feel comforted at once. She will let you partake of the treasures she keeps in her heart, for “never has it been known that anyone who sought her protection was left unaided.”