Saturday, June 2, 2018

On the Call to Holiness in Today's World

We continue reading through Gaudete et Exsultate, the Apostolic Exhortation promulgated in April:

"We are never completely ourselves unless we belong to a people.  That is why no one is saved alone, as an isolated individual.  Rather, God draws us to himself, taking into account the complex fabric of interpersonal relationships present in a human community.  God wanted to enter into the life and history of a people" (n. 6).

"I like to contemplate the holiness present in the patience of God's people: in those parents who raise their children with immense love, in those men and women who work hard to support their families, in the sick, in elderly religious who never lose their smile.  In their daily perseverance I see the holiness of the Church militant.  Very often it is a holiness found in our next-door neighbours, those who, living in our midst, reflect God's presence.  We might call them 'the middle class of holiness'" (n. 7).

"[St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross] writes: 'The greatest figures of prophecy and sanctity step forth out of the darkest night.  But for the most part, the formative stream of the mystical life remains invisible.  Certainly the most decisive turning points in world history are substantially co-determined by souls whom no history book ever mentions.  And we will only find out about those souls to whom we owe the decisive turning points in our personal lives on the day when all that is hidden is revealed'" (n. 8).


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