452. Thirty-second Tuesday of Ordinary Time
Meditations no. 398 (unofficial computer-aided translation)
Our life should be joyful and willing service.
One day some time ago, when engaged in our ordinary work, we felt drawn to Christ who was passing by. And we said âYesâ with the full freedom of love. We wanted to respond to his call, to be faithful, well aware that we were being invited to a complete dedication based on love. We knew that the legitimate freedom of upright men and women leads them, with the help of grace, to want to serve God and all creatures. ServĂte DĂłmino in veritĂĄte: serve the Lord in truth, Tobias advised his children. And I now give you the same advice, for we have received Godâs call to render a particular service to his Church and all souls. Our only ambition, our only desire in Opus Dei is to serve the Church as the Church wants to be served, within the specific vocation our Lord has given us.
Nos sumus servi Dei caeli et terrae, we are servants of the God of heaven and earth. This is our whole life, my daughters and sons.
Our life in the Work is a freely accepted and willing service. The members of the Work are as free as the birds, amid all human activities. Itâs impossible for them to feel forced into anything by the Directors. And they come to the Work to give themselves, to surrender themselves, to serve. This service is made specific by the apostolic task, whether large or small, that the Directors entrust to us. Thus our eagerness to be useful does not get lost in generalities. We shoulder a portion of the Work as our own specific responsibility.
The Gospel of todayâs Mass speaks to us of service: we claim no other right than to continue serving. When you have done all that is commanded you, say, âWe are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our dutyâ. Itâs good to pray frequently about the fact that the meaning of our life is constant, self-sacrificing service. By our call, our rights have become duties: the duty to be more generous, and to renounce our ego finally and permanently.
To serve freely: such is the glory of a child of God. Our Father wrote: Freely, as children and not as slaves, we follow the path which our Lord has marked out for each of us. We relish our freedom as a gift from God.
I opt for God because I want to, freely, without compulsion of any kind. And I undertake to serve, to turn my whole life into a means of serving others, out of love for my Lord Jesus. It is this freedom which moves me to cry out that nothing on earth can separate me from the love of Christ.
Responsibility of mature people.
You donât yet realize what great love God has shown each of us by calling us to be among the first in the Work. When thirty years have gone by, our Father said in 1955, youâll look back and be amazed. And youâll spend the rest of your life giving thanks, giving thanks⊠As we contemplate the bountiful gifts God has poured out on us, our soul is filled with joy. And our sense of responsibility is renewed.
My beloved daughters and sons, our Father wrote, realize how many things God, the Church, and all mankind expect from Opus Dei, which is still like a seed hidden in the furrow. Appreciate all the greatness of your vocation and love it more each day. And resolve to be the instrument God needs, full of optimism, joy and supernatural spirit.
So forward, my children. Jesus and the Church are expecting a lot from you.
Opus Grande ego fĂĄcio, I am engaged in a great undertaking. In willing Opus Dei, God chose us to be among the first generations: the initial links in a chain that will continue as long as there are people on earth. This is yet another spur to our sense of responsibility, regardless of how old we are. And Iâll give you the measure for our responsibility, our Father wrote: that of the parent of a large and poor family. You have no right to live or act like children: you are parents of a family. Our spiritual parenthood, if we are faithful, will be like St Paulâs: my brethren, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown. As our Father said, we need to foster a great sense of responsibility, because youâre going to exercise a great spiritual parenthood with your brothers or sisters, which will afterwards be a great crown in heaven if youâre faithful.
In the Work there no one who is under age. When Opus Dei was still new-born and our Father had only a handful of young people at his side, he wrote: make up for your lack of years by your âgravityâ, which is not stiffness or rigidity, but a sign of the order and purity of your interior life. Consider the words from the Psalm as being addressed to yourselves: super senes intellĂ©xi, quia mandĂĄta tua quaesĂvi; I understood more than the aged, for I sought, studied, and practised your commandments.
Our Fatherâs advice has perennial relevance: get this into your heads and into your hearts: we wonât achieve anything unless we are saints.
Importance of helping with our good example.
If you learn how to serve others, our Father wrote, how well they themselves will learn to serve! How sensitive you will become and help the others to be so! For you will teach by example, which is how one ought to teach. Afterwards, when youâve helped them with your witness, you can give the doctrine, the theory. Each of us has to be alter Christus, ipse Christus (another Christ, Christ Himself): and Jesus Christ coepit fĂĄcere et docĂ©re (he began to do and to teach).
In the wars of old, in moments of danger, it was the general who carried the flag and the others followed. Example!
We need to help the others: none of us is alone. We need to encourage them to give themselves gladly. You mustnât destroy your brothersâ or sistersâ souls. In spite of your passions, you are responsible for their holiness of the others, for the effectiveness of all.
We will be responsible if we strive to be on the front line, in the thick of things. We should carry out our work with the others in mind, helping them to be effective. First of all, we should be careful not to hold up whatever has to pass through our hands. We finish our work as well as possible to help those who will continue it. We leave notes of experience, so that whoever replaces us can begin where we left off; weâre glad to see others carry out our work more effectively; we teach those with us how to work well⊠and countless other details that a responsible person easily discovers.
Brethren, St Paul wrote, join in imitating me, and mark those who so live as you have an example in us. Whoever strives to practise the spirit of the Work well is a model for everyone, even without intending it. Good or bad example stands out, for as Jesus said: a city set on a hill cannot be hid. And St Gregory comments: words backed up by the life of the speaker, penetrate easily into the heart of the listener.
The Christian is the salt and light of the world, not because he conquers or triumphs, but because he bears witness to Godâs love. And he wonât be salt if he canât give flavour. Nor will he be light if he doesnât bear witness to Jesus through his example and word, if he loses sight of the purpose of his life.
We finish our prayer by examining our conscience, to see whether the example of our life of dedication is convincing to those alongside us. And as we know that such help depends very directly on the consistency of our whole life, we must beg our Lord, through his Mother who is our Mother too, to increase his love in us, to grant us a taste of the sweetness of his presence. Only when we love do we attain the fullest freedom: the freedom of not wanting ever to abandon, for all eternity, the object of our love.