Wisdom, Chapter 17, Verse 12-15
12
For fear is nought but the surrender of the helps that come from
reason; 13
and the more one’s expectation is
of itself uncertain, the more one makes of not knowing the cause that brings on
torment.
14 So
they, during that night, powerless though it was, since it had come upon them
from the recesses of a powerless Hades, while all sleeping the same sleep, 15 Were
partly smitten by fearsome apparitions
and partly stricken by their souls’ surrender; for fear overwhelmed them, sudden and unexpected.
A distressed conscience always magnifies misfortunes
therefore terror is surrender to insanity, hence, when the terrors come reason
that God is greater than the night.
Fear Reason and the Last Judgement
“Let us prepare, then,” encouraged the Pope, to meet our judge with confidence and joyful trust in his promises.”
One of the most remarkable
characteristics[1] of all forms of organic life is
the power to adapt itself to the circumstances in which it is placed. It will
endeavor under the most altered conditions to live, and, in order to live, it
will resort to all kinds of contrivances, sometimes effecting such changes in
its outward appearance that none but a trained eye could detect its identity.
Yet with all these adaptations, it will preserve its identity. Man possesses
this power in perhaps a higher degree than any other form of life. He can find
his home in any country, in any climate, under an almost infinite variety of
conditions. He can live and adapt himself to circumstances involving the most
violent contrasts and soon settle down and find the means of making himself at
home. But man has other needs and another life beside that of his physical
nature. He is something more than an animal and needs more than food and
shelter. For the life of man is above all things a mental life. He can never
rid himself of the companions of his mind. He is not the mere creature of his
outward circumstances. There are other surroundings that are far more intimate
and closer to him than any external things, however nearly they may touch upon him.
These things can but touch the surface of his being; his thoughts enter into the
sanctuary of his soul. The beast is wholly dependent upon what it finds around
it. Man can live a life practically independent of most of these things. In the
utmost solitude, he can gather around him a company of his closest and most
intimate friends, and in the crowded thoroughfares of life, he can be alone
with them. You may tell a man by his friends, but there are no friends so
intimate as his thoughts. If you know the
companions of his mind, you will know what kind of man he is.
It is
not the sufferings or the consolations of life that directly affect character,
but the thoughts that men call around them at such times. No external thing can
in itself affect the inner life of the soul. Men are material; the soul is
spiritual.
Choose Which Thoughts
to Listen To
We
often attribute to such things some moral characteristic, but in themselves
they are neither good nor bad. The same things do harm to one person and good
to another: suffering has been a curse to some and a blessing to others;
poverty has closed the door of Heaven to some, and to others it has been the
source of beatitude. The value of these things comes from the thoughts the soul
calls around itself when it encounters such things. Some trouble comes into a
person’s life, and instantly there gathers around him, through the door opened
by that trouble, a crowd of thoughts, anger, rebellion, bitterness, and
discontent and, at the same time, thoughts of penitence, acceptance, and the
example of our Lord. The outward trouble has thrown open an unseen door into
the spiritual world, and in flow this mixed crowd of thoughts, swarming around
the soul and clamoring for a hearing. The
soul must choose among them all which it will listen to and which it will reject,
and by that choice, it rises or falls. One person chooses thoughts that
heal, encourage, and strengthen him; another, those that stir him to bitterness
and revolt. The morality lies not in the thing but in the person.
The soul must choose, and what it
chooses it will probably choose again and again, until that chosen thought
gains the right of entrance, and closes the door to all others, and becomes the
constant companion of the soul.
And in every event, great and small, it
enters and takes its place, instructing its pupil as to its meaning,
interpreting it, explaining it — its hidden purpose, its power for good or evil
— or misrepresenting it and making the good seem evil and the evil good, and gradually
becoming master of its whole life, the molder of its character.
Indeed,
it is true. These secret and unseen companions of the soul, intangible and
volatile as they are, affect our whole view of men and things around us. The
hard, substantial facts of life are interpreted by them; they become plastic in
their hands and change their appearance and coloring at their bidding. These
phantom forms that rise out of the darkness and return to it again, colorless,
impalpable, ethereal, that speak in inarticulate whispers and touch us with
ghostly hands, are more real to us than the solid earth and the strong
mountains. They can veil the heavens for us and take the brightness out of the
sunshine and deepen the shadows at noonday or make the darkest day seem bright.
For they come from the same land whence the soul comes; they are of closer
kinship than any material thing can be. And it is the mind that sees, not the
eye. It is in the light that burns within that all outward things are seen.
Amid the pleasant laughter and genial companionship of friends, some thought
silently enters, holds up its lantern and casts its pale light around, and,
seen in that light, all is suddenly turned to ashes, the voices lose their
ring, and the laughter becomes hollow and cheerless. One thought in an instant
has changed the whole scene from life to death.
It is thus in the thought’s men
choose as their companions on their way through the world that the key to their
interpretation of life is to be found.
Different men view the same things in different ways. And the same men, in the
course of a few years, alter their whole view of life. They have simply changed
their companions on the road. Indeed, the breaking with one set of people and
the forming ties of friendship with others of a different type is often but the
outward evidence and result of a hidden and inward change of the more intimate
friendships of the mind.
Drive bad thoughts
out with good ones
There
is a better way: the positive rather than the negative way. Let not your mind
be overcome with evil, “but overcome evil with good.” The
emptying the mind of evil is not the first step toward filling it with good. It
is not a step in that direction at all. If you succeeded in emptying your mind
of every undesirable thought, what then? You cannot empty it and then begin to
fill it with better thoughts. No, you must
empty it of evil by filling it with good. Nature abhors a vacuum. You drive out
darkness by filling the room with light. If you wish to fill a glass with
water, you do not first expel the air; you expel the air by pouring in water.
In the moral life, there is no intermediate state of vacuum possible in which,
having driven out the evil; you begin to bring in good. As the good enters, it
expels the evil. Therefore, the effort of the soul must be to fill the mind so full of healthy thoughts that there is
no room for others — trying not so much not to think of what is evil as to
think of what is good. The mind is ever working, never at rest. It will feed
upon whatever food is given it. If it is given wholesome food, it will develop
and grow strong.
He, therefore, who wishes to
overcome any habit of evil thoughts must do so indirectly rather than directly,
trying not so much not to indulge in anger as to fill the mind with loving and
kindly thoughts, meeting discontent by rejoicing in the will of God,
self-consciousness by wrapping himself around in the presence of God — turning
as promptly as possible to think of something bracing when he is conscious of
the presence or approach
of evil.
This,
and the constant effort to keep the mind interested and occupied about healthy subjects
that it can enjoy without strain or weariness will do much to recover it from
the ill effects of the lack of discipline. It is a great matter to know how to
give it relaxation without laxity and, by its studies and recreations, to
prepare it for prayer and the more strenuous work of life. A mind that has a
wide reach of interests and is constantly kept busy will have no time and no
care for morbid thoughts. And the mind that is constantly fed on healthy and
nourishing food will turn away from poison, however daintily served. All this,
it will be perceived, can be done with little introspection or self-analysis.
It is based on the wisest of all systems: that nature works best if she is not
too closely watched. A person who is always anxious about his health will never
be healthy. Nature knows her own laws, and it is not good to interfere too
much, even for the sake of putting them right. It is not an unknown experience
that torturing scruples may take the place of mental laxity and a ceaseless
introspection, which is the enemy of all freshness and spontaneity. We must take heed so that, in the efforts to
overcome one evil, we do not fall into a worse one. We have to change the habit
of the mind without giving it any undue shock, to keep it well in hand without
seeming to watch it, to bring it under control without enslaving it and while
seeming to leave it in perfect liberty. And to do this we need to have some
confidence in its power to rectify itself if it is healthily fed and duly
exercised.
By Fr. Basil W.
Maturin (1847–1915) who was an Anglican priest who became a Catholic priest at
age 51. Both before and after his conversion, he was famous for his preaching
and psychological insight: he had a profound gift for guiding souls. In 1915 he
was on board the Lusitania when a German U-boat sank the ship; he drowned after
helping numerous other passengers to safety.
Mindful Habits of
Reverence
1. Pay a visit to the
Blessed Sacrament as often as possible; even a "pop" call is better
than none.
2. Receive Holy
Communion frequently, daily if possible.
3. Approach the
Communion devoutly; make sure your attire is in keeping with the sacredness of
the occasion.
4. Avoid all
unnecessary noise during the sacred moments of the Consecration of the Mass.
5. Attend weekday
Mass whenever possible.
6. Prepare to receive
our Eucharistic Lord. Following the Mass prayers by using a Missal is
recommended.
7. Spend at least
fifteen minutes in prayer as an act of thanksgiving after receiving Christ's
Body and Blood in Holy Communion.
8. Often make a
spiritual communion, particularly when attending Mass without receiving the
sacrament of the Eucharist.
9. Have Holy Masses
read for the souls of your loved ones.
10. Participate in the
Forty Hours Devotion of our parish churches.
11. Get into the habit
of reciting ejaculatory prayers in honor of the Real Presence.
12. When genuflecting
before the tabernacle say: "Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, I adore and
love You."
Daily
Devotions
Comments
Post a Comment