517. March 19, Solemnity of St Joseph (I)

Meditations no. 449 (unofficial computer-aided translation)

Our initial self-giving was the beginning of a new life, for which we give thanks to God today.

Faith, hope, love: these are the supports of Joseph’s life and. of all Christian lives. Joseph’s self-giving is an interweaving of faithful love, loving faith and confident hope. His feast is thus a good opportunity for us to renew our commitment to the Christian calling God has given each of us.

Today our vocation to the Work is rejuvenated with the charm and freshness it had at the beginning, even though for many of us the moment in which we gave ourselves completely to God in Opus Dei is long since past. That day God made us see what he was asking of us, filling our soul with light. The light of the vocation made us take a stand in life that we maintain enthusiastically and cheerfully. It fills us with hope, a hope that will last until we die.

There opened up before our eyes a broad path that embraced the whole of our life. With youthful drive, or with mature and calm serenity, we took up the way full of faith and supernatural optimism, determined to be saints and to sanctify many others, because the vocation endows our work with a sense of mission. It ennobles and enriches our existence. We knew that along the way we would encounter uphill climbs and dense wilderness, obstacles and tiredness… , but all was clear because it was the will of God. Jesus had entered with authority, into the soul, yours and mine, giving us the initial push - to which we corresponded freely - and promising us that he himself would give us his fortitude along the way.

Time has passed, much or little, and the passage of the days has only served to confirm us in the assurance of the first steps: Christ continues to move us onwards day by day. With absolute confidence in him we continue on, and we do not cease to marvel at the love of predilection he has shown us.

How often I have made those words of Isaiah resound in your ears! They are words which the prophet heard from the mouth of God, and which God himself addresses to you and to me: Ego redemi te et vocavi te nomine tuo; meus es tu! (Is 43: 1). Tell me if it is not a whole dialogue of love. I have sacrificed myself for you, I have redeemed you, I have given my life for you, and I have called you by your name! It is beautiful! I have called you by your name: meus es tu!, you are mine!

And you, my daughter, my son, I as well, have known how to correspond to this call from God, and you have answered: Yes! I am yours, and I give myself to you, and I nail myself to the Cross willingly, being in the middle of the world a soul dedicated to you, to your glory, given over to spreading your kingdom, to the co-redemption of the whole human race.

The renewal of our dedication is an act of faith, of hope and of love which unites us more with Jesus Christ.

God has got hold of our heart, our whole life. One day, by his infinite goodness, we felt the loving glance, which subdued us for ever. And we must strive to make that love last and grow more intense, more delicate, day by day.

And what will I do so that my love lasts, so that it grows? My child, go on leaving aside the old man, giving up too those things which are good in themselves but which are no longer compatible with what God is asking of us. Tell our Lord with deeds and constantly: ecce ego quia vocasti me (1 Sam 3: 9), here I am, because you have called me.

Our love has grown stronger since that happy day, and our dedication, far from being the result of inertia, has become conscious and pondered. Today, on the solemnity of St Joseph, we have the custom of renewing - as we do so many times throughout the day - our commitment of love with Jesus Christ. With a stronger, more mature determination; with a new vigour, that of a proven love.

Years ago, on another 19th of March, our founder was speaking to some of his children. Today one of your brothers was telling us in the morning meditation that to renew is not simply to repeat something that has already been done. But I tell you more: to renew is to become young again, to become new. Os novos, the Portuguese call young people, os novos: how beautiful, to go back to being new! I am already sixty-two… , but when I say at the foot of the altar: ad Deum qui laetificat iuventutem meam, I feel young, and I believe I will never grow old, because I will be constantly renewing myself.

Be very young, all of you. Renew yourselves! Right now I renew my Fidelity, and I gain the indulgence. There are many young people who are old, because they are not able to give themselves. To renew is to become young again, to become new, to have a new ability to give oneself.

When we renew out of devotion, on any day, at any hour, we are more free than ever. Each time we renew the Oblation or the Fidelity, out of devotion, in addition to gaining an indulgence, we tell our Lord: my freedom is for you. If my freedom and my honour are not for your service, why do I want them? And then we are more free than ever.

I cannot understand freedom without self-surrender or self-surrender without freedom. One reality gives emphasis and support to the other…

My children, we are like a family, which grows and develops in libertatem gloriae filiorum Dei (Rom 8: 21), qua libertate Christus nos liberavit (Gal 4: 31) - in the freedom and glory of the children of God, with the freedom Jesus Christ has won for us. But, for love of that freedom, we want to be well tied down. That is, moreover, the greatest manifestation of freedom; to tell our Lord: put iron handcuffs on me, tie me to you, because I only want to serve you and love you. Freedom can only be given up out of Love; any other type of slavery I cannot understand.

In this way, the renewal of your commitment is not a matter of picking up again something neglected. When there really is faith, hope and love, renewal means staying in God’s hands, despite our personal faults, mistakes and defects. It is a confirmation of our faithfulness. Renewing our commitment means renewing our fidelity to what God wants of us: it means expressing our love in deeds.

Love has certain standard features. Sometimes we speak of love as if it were an impulse to self-satisfaction or a mere means to selfish fulfilment of one’s own personality. But that’s not love. True love means going out of oneself, giving oneself. Love brings joy, but a joy whose roots are in the shape of a cross. As long as we are on earth and have not yet arrived at the fullness of the future life, we can never have true love without sacrifice and pain. This pain becomes sweet and lovable; it is the source of interior joy. But it is an authentic pain, for it involves overcoming one’s own selfishness and taking Love as the rule of each and everything we do.

We ask our Lord to make us faithful until the end.

Hold me close to thy heart, close as locket or bracelet fits; not death itself is so strong as love. We still have a long way to go. Our desires of fidelity, renewed on this feast of St Joseph, want to reach to the very last day. We know that our life has no more meaning than that of being faithful to God until death. What we are giving over is not just a few years of life, but the whole of our existence. God has asked us for everything: everything we had, and everything that youth promised us. Yet it is all nothing compared to what he gives us in return: a life of happiness on earth and the eternal, indescribable glory of heaven.

In order to make our desires of fidelity more efficacious we should never forget that we have a treasure, then, in our keeping but its shell is of perishable earthenware; it must be God, and not anything in ourselves, that gives it its sovereign power. The final perseverance that opens up the gates of heaven is a grace that cannot be strictly deserved and that God grants out of pure mercy. Nonetheless, God, who has already shown us his love in many ways, will not refuse this grace to someone who has been loyal to his or her commitments: Since thou hast been faithful over little things, I have great things to commit to thy charge; come and share the joy of thy Lord. God rewards constant fidelity on earth with eternal fidelity in heaven. Doesn’t it make you happy to know that fidelity depends in good measure on ourselves? I get enthused when I think that God loves me, and that he has wanted his Work to depend also on my correspondence. And it fills me with joy to be able to tell him freely: Lord, I love you too; count on my littleness.

Our life is short and of little value. But it is all we have to give God and we offer it to him once again, now, as a token of that sincere decision we made one day. Our greatest aspiration is to end this earthly life with an act of love and of service. For this reason we should never forget that in Opus Dei faithfulness is absolutely essential. It confirms our mission of being co-redeemers with Christ. We also have to appreciate that it is a virtue in the natural order too. There are people who are not good Catholics, who lead immoral lives, who misbehave in practically every area, but who will not allow anybody to criticise their mother. They defend her with all their strength. There are others who are loyal to their country or to their company, without being great models of virtue in other respects.

I would like us to raise this natural virtue of fidelity to the supernatural plane and make it the basis for perseverance in serving the Church, souls, the Work and our vocation. That is why I ask you, my children, never to forget the noble virtue of loyalty, which is the basis for fidelity, a fidelity that is happiness.

We ask St Joseph, our Father and Lord, and his Immaculate Spouse, our Mother Holy Mary, to obtain for us from their Son the grace of fidelity until the end. Call upon her with all your strength: ‘Virgo fidelis!’, Virgin most faithful!, and ask her that those of us who call ourselves God’s friends may truly be so at all times.