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Showing posts with label Mystics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mystics. Show all posts

Saturday, 1 August 2015

Luisa Piccerreta. The Divine Firmness excerpt Vol. 21, and Frank M. Rega OFS


Saturday, 1 August 2015

Luisa Piccerreta. The Divine Firmness excerpt Vol. 21, and Frank M. Rega OFS


Product Details

 COMMENT Book of Heaven:
Text, quotation from Luisa Piccarreta from Vol. 21 before. 
Frank M. Regan OFS has 3 books of abridgment from Luisa, and in ways beautifully clear in sense. http://www.frankrega.com/luisaimportant.htm  
Example parallel below.

Life of the Mystic Luisa Piccarreta: Journeys in the Divine Will - The Middle Years - Part-B

2 Oct 2014
by Frank Rega

Divine Will Volume Twenty-one
VOLUME 21
J.M.J.
Fiat!

March 5, 1927
How firmness in good is only of God, for once He has done an act, it never ceases. Effects of firmness. How the Humanity of Our Lord was the bond of times, the remedy and the model. How God wants the rights of the Divine Will to be secured.

I felt myself in a slumber of affliction because of the privation of my sweet Jesus, and in my interior I said to Him: ‘My Love and my life, how is it? You have departed from me without saying good-bye, without teaching me where to direct my steps, or the way I must follow in order to find You. Even more, it seems to me that You Yourself have burned away the paths through which You may be found. And as much as I wander around and call You, You do not listen to me – the paths are closed; and exhausted with tiredness, I am forced to stop, longing for the One whom I wish to find at any cost, but I don’t. Ah! Jesus! Jesus! Come back - come to the one who cannot live without You.’
But while I was pouring out my pain, He just barely moved in my interior; and as I felt Him move, I said to Him: ‘My Jesus, my life, how is it? You make me wait for so long, to the point that I cannot take anymore; and if You make Yourself seen, You just flash by, and You don’t say anything to me. So it becomes darker than before, and I remain fidgety and delirious with pain; I search for You; I call You – but I wait for You in vain.’

 
The Divine Firmness
And Jesus, compassionating me, told me: “My daughter, do not fear, I am here with you. What I want is that you never go out of my Will, and that you continue your acts - always, without ever moving from the boundaries of the Kingdom of the Supreme Fiat. This will give you the firmness which will make you be like your Creator – once He has done an act, that act has the virtue of continuing, without ever ceasing. An act which is always continuous, is only of God, who suffers no interruption in His acts. This is why Our firmness is unshakable, and extending everywhere with Our immensity, it renders Our acts uninterrupted. Wherever We lean, We find Our firmness, which gives Us the greatest honor – it makes Us known as the Supreme Being, Creator of all, and renders Our Being and Our acts inexorable. In fact, whatever place We want to lean on, We find Our firmness, which sustains everything.

My daughter, firmness is of divine nature, and a divine endowment; and so it is right that We give this participation and endowment of divine nature to one who must be daughter of Our Divine Fiat, and who must live in Our Kingdom. So, the fact that you continue your acts in It, without ever interrupting them, reveals that you already are in possession of the endowment of Our firmness. How many thingsfirmness says. It says that the souls moves only for God; it says that she moves with reason and out of pure love – not with passion and out of self-interest. It says that she knows the good she does, and therefore she is firm in it, without ever interrupting it. Firmness says, with indelible characters: “Here, there is the finger of God”. Therefore, be firm in your acts, and you will have Our divine firmness within your works.”

Afterwards, I was continuing my acts in the Supreme Volition, and as I arrived at the point of following the acts of Jesus, from the moment of His conception in the womb of the Immaculate Queen, up to His death on the Cross, my adorable Jesus, making Himself felt again in my interior, told me: “My daughter, my Humanity came upon earth as though in the midst of times, in order to reunite the past, when, in creation, the fullness of my Will reigned in man. Everything belonged to It; everywhere It had Its kingdom – Its operative and divine life. And I enclosed this fullness of my Divine Will in Me, and binding those in the present, first I became the model to form the remedies which were needed, the helps and the teachings which were necessary to heal them; and then I bound the posterity to the fullness of that Divine Will which reigned in the first times of creation.

Therefore, my coming upon earth was a bond of reunion of times; it was the remedy in order to form this bond, so that the Kingdom of the Divine Fiat might return into the midst of creatures; it was the model for all, so that, being molded, they would be tied to the bonds formed by Me. This is why, before speaking to you about my Will, I spoke to you about my coming upon earth, of what I did and suffered, in order to give you the remedies and the model of my own life; and then, I spoke to you about my Will: it was bonds that I formed in you, and in these bonds I formed the Kingdom of my Will. A sign of this is the many knowledges I manifested to you about It; Its sorrow for not reigning with all Its fullness in the midst of creatures, and the goods It promises to the children of Its Kingdom.”

Then I continued to pray, and I was almost asleep, when, all of a sudden, I heard someone speak in a loud voice within me. I paid closer attention, and I saw my beloved Jesus with His arms raised, in the act of embracing me, saying to me with powerful voice: “My daughter, I ask nothing else from you but this: that you be the daughter, the mother, the sister of my Will, and that you place in safety within you, Its rights, Its honour, Its glory.” He said this with a loud and powerful voice. Then, lowering His voice and hugging me, He added: “My daughter, the reason for which I want the rights of my Eternal Fiat to be secured, is that I want to enclose the Most Holy Trinity in the soul. My Divine Will alone can give Us the place and the glory worthy of Us. Through It, We can operate freely and place in you all the good of creation, forming even more beautiful things, because with Our Will in the soul, We can do everything, while, without It, We would lack the place in which to put Ourselves, and in which to lay Our works; so not being free, We remain in Our celestial residences.

It happens as to a king, who, loving one of his subjects with excessive love, wants to lower himself to live in his little hovel. But he wants to be free; he wants to put royal things in the little hovel; he wants to command; he wants that subject to eat of his good and delicate foods together with him. In sum, he wants to live his life of king. But the subject does not want him to put his royal things, or to command; nor does he want to adapt himself to the food of the king. The king does not feel free; so, for love of freedom, he goes back to his royal palace.

Wherever my Will does not reign, I am not free; the human will causes a continuous contrast with Mine; therefore, not having Our rights secured, We cannot reign, so We remain in Our royal palace.”

March 10, 1927
How, in Creation, God gave the rights to possess the Kingdom of the Divine Will.
 .........


Life of the Mystic Luisa Piccarreta
The Middle Years - Part B
LuisPiccarreta
PrĂ©cis (abridged)  by Frank M. Rega OFS 2014
  
www.lifeofluisa.com  

The Divine Firmness

Luisa was restless and sorrowful because of the absence of the One with Whom she could not live without. But the Lord, compassionating her, said that she should not fear, because He is with her. He told her that He never wants her to go out of His Will. She must continue her acts, without ever moving from the boundaries of the Kingdom of the Supreme Fiat. This  gives her a firmness [fermezza], similar to that of her Creator. Once He has done an act, it has continuous life, and never ceases. This firmness is unshakable, and it extends everywhere in the divine immensity. It gives the Divinity great honour, making God known as the Supreme Being and Creator of everything.

His firmness sustains everything. It is of a divine nature and quality, and it is right that the daughter of the Fiat who lives in thDivine Kingdom should participate in this qualityWhen Luisa continues her acts in HiWillwithout ever interrupting themit reveals that she is in possession of the quality of the divine firmnessSuch solidity indicates that the soul moves onlfor Godthat she acts with reason and out of pure lovenot from passion or self-interestShe knows the good that she does and remains firm in it,without stopping. Firmness signifies the presence othe finger of God.

After thiswhile Luisa was continuing to prayshe suddenly heard Jesus speaking within her in a loud and powerful voice. He told her that He wants her to be the daughter, motherand sister of His Willand asked that she place its rightshonor and glorin safety within herselfThensoftening His voice and embracing herHe said that the reason He wants the rights of the Eternal Fiat placed in safetis because He wants to enclose the Most Holy Trinity in the soulOnly the Divine Will can give the Divinity the place and glorworthof ItBy means of the Fiatthe Most High can operate freely and lay within her all the good of Creationforming yet more beautiful things.
With the Fiat reigning in the soulthe Trinitcan do everythingbut without itthe place in which the Divinity can enclose Itself and operate freely is lacking. Wherever the Divine Will doenot reignGod does not feel free, since the human will causes continuous contrast with the Divine VolitionNot being free and without His rights in safety, God remains in the celestial dwellings (03/05/1927).

Luisa is Important - Frank Rega

www.frankrega.com/luisaimportant.htm
12 Feb 2014 - ... that introduces her writings,. Life of the Mystic Luisa Piccarreta Journeys in the Divine Will - the Early Years. please visit www.lifeofluisa.com ...

Thursday, 25 June 2015

Birthday of St. John the Baptist. | National Gallery, Saint John the Baptist: From Birth to Beheading

----- Forwarded Message -----
From: William J .....
To: Donald..
Sent: Thursday, 25 June 2015, 16:38
Subject: Query re feature in Burlington House Cartoon

Madonna Child Anne and John Baptist
Dear Father Donald,
 
Do I see the hand and finger of St Anne in this very refined image of the Cartoon, or is it part of the background... why! I have never noticed it before! It seems almost out-of-perspective, and yet... does the infant Jesus rest his arm upon this hand? If so, what is St Anne indicating? It almost seems to be an unfinished part of the drawing.
A curious watcher, loving this picture and the commentary you provide, just as always, 
William.
+ + +
Later, William,
Previous Blogspot 24 Jun 2013 and cf. Leonardo  da Vinci...later.
 
 
COMMUNITY CHAPTER SERMON - Fr. Raymond
below.      

  • 24 June 2015 

     
Preview | Saint John the Baptist: From Birth to Beheading | National Gallery, London

   
2,470
Published on 24 Jun 2014
John the Baptist has been painted by some of the most famous artists in the National Gallery from Piero della Francesca and Leonardo to Caravaggio and Puvis de Chavannes. But who was he and why has he been so important to artists and patrons over the centuries?

Over a series of 10 films the art historian Jennifer Sliwka and theologian Ben Quash share the highlights of their collaborative MA course between the National Gallery and King's College London, to explore the life of one of the greatest figures in Biblical history and one of the most represented saints in art.


       
Youtube Video

COMMENT:
12th Week Ord Time
Wednesday 24th  
On the Solemnity of the Birthday of St. John the Baptist, it is the 56th anniversary of Ordination of Priesthood. The 1959 souvenir cards long gone. The motto words of Psalm 26(27):4, remain at heart.
There is one thing I ask of the Lord
for this I long,
to live in the house of the Lord,
all the days of my life,
in the savour of the sweetness of the Lord,
to behold his temple. [Ps. 26:4, Grail 1963]



http://www.athanasius.com/psalms/psalms1.html#27 

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++




The most interesting subject for the Birthday of St. John of the Baptist in the Leonardo Charcoal Cartoon for the Virgin and Child with St. Anne and the Infant St. John (Burlington House, London).



COLORPLATE 33
Painted 1499-1501
BURLINGTON HOUSE CARTOON (VIRGIN AND CHILD WITH ST. ANNE), detail
Charcoal heightened with white on brown paper
National Gallery, London

The face of the Virgin in the Burlington House Cartoon accords with the type Leonardo had established seventeen years before in the Virgin of the Madonna of the Rocks in the Louvre (colour plate 18), yet it betrays the deep changes these long years had wrought in his art and that the other Madonna of the Rocks, the London version, first began to reveal. Something of that sweet harmony and well-being have survived, but now the face is that of a mature woman and is suffused with feelings and compassion that arc the direct result of an emotional and human concern with the actions of the children. Realistic behaviour has replaced elusive ethereality. The Virgin's head is voluminous and its structure more systematically defined than in Leonardo's earlier work. Moreover, the slight incline of the head is no longer a convention, as it was in the Madonna of the Rocks, but the result of a conscious movement. However, she still has the force of an idealized and universal presence.

The contrast between St. Anne's strange face and the pleasantly candid one of the Virgin could not be more striking. The older woman's narrow, deep set eyes, her deliberately compressed lips, and her curious mannered smile give the face an animation and a seer-like wisdom befitting one who attempts to communicate to a contented Virgin the dreadful knowledge of her son's future sacrifice. Leonardo's persistent search into the realm of the inner mind has given him access to emotions and psychological states that have now a mystical substance, which acts to expand upon and enrich the mere human condition.
Professor Wasserman
Leonardo

 COMMUNITY CHAPTER SERMON - Fr. Raymond

----- Forwarded Message -----
From: Fr. Raymond ....
To: Donald ....
Sent: Tuesday, 23 June 2015, 10:47
Subject: ST JOHN BAPTIST

 
ST JOHN THE BAPTIST
When we call St John the Baptist the Precursor of the Lord we immediately think of the way he prepared the way for the Lord’s coming.  We think of: The example of his ascetic life; and we think of his fearless preaching; a preaching that was to cost him his life.  But there is another way, and perhaps a much more important way in which he prepared for the Lord’s coming.  This was not so much by what he did, or by what he said, great as these things were,  but it was also by the very fact of just who he was, and by what he represented in  God’s great plan for the accomplishment of the world’s salvation;  God’s great plan for the preparation of his people; to enable them recognise and accept the Messiah when he came.
Jesus hints at this when he says of John: “Of men born of women there has risen none greater than John the Baptist”.  In these words Jesus proclaims to all the world that the Person of John was the climax of all that the Old Testament was meant to be. John was its ultimate and perfect fulfilment.  Sanctified in the womb, he stands in the Old Testament in something the same kind of way as Mary, sanctified at her conception, does in the New.  As Mary is the ultimate fulfilment of the New Testament children of God, so John is the ultimate fulfilment of the Old Testament children of God.  God’s plans were never frustrated by man’s infidelities in the Old Testament.  The Old Testament was not a failure.  John the Baptist brought it to its perfect fulfilment.  -  “look!  There is the Lamb of God!” He cried.  At that moment the thousands of years of Old Testament History were shown to be fulfilled.
This link between the Old Testament and the New is seen dramatically proved and  portrayed for us in the strikingly parallel stories of the Annunciation and the Birth, the Passion and the Death, of John and of Jesus, side by side in the Gospel stories.
So when Jesus tells us that there has risen no man greater than John he is not saying necessarily that John is greater than Abraham or Moses, let alone his Blessed Mother.  He is rather saying that John’s greatness is not so much a personal one as one of his role and office in the history of salvation.  Jesus then goes on to speak of you and me, the children of the New Testament.  We are all greater than John, he says, and this in so far as it is a greater destiny to know just who and what the Messiah is and to be a part of his kingdom than it is to be the greatest of the prophets who could only look forward to some dim distant future coming.
This greatness of John, then, as the personification of the ultimate fulfilment of the Old Testament means that the whole of the Old Testament is one great preparation for the coming of Christ.  All its wonderful stories, all its great characters are meant to illustrate, in one way or another the person and mission of Christ.  If we stick to the New Testament only then we cannot fathom the full depth of the mystery of Christ;  We will miss so much of the meaning to be drawn from the beautiful and powerful imagery of the Old Testament as it gradually infolds for us the heights and the depths of the riches of Christ.
Therefore when St Jerome gave us his famous saying that “ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ” he was not referring to the Gospels only but also to the whole of the Old Testament as well, right from the Book of Genesis through to the Baptist himself who straddles both Testament like a great Colossus.
Sancta Maria Abbey: http://www.nunraw.com.uk (Website)     
Blogspot :http://www.nunraw.blogspot.co.uk, Doneword :http://www.donewill.blogspot.co.uk    |domdonald.org.uk,   Emails: nunrawdonald@yahoo.com, nunrawdonald@gmail.com

Tuesday, 23 June 2015

Luisa, prayer is one single point. Chrysostom, prayer was very short

COMMENTS:

"Christ and Paul com­manded us to make our prayers short, and to say them frequently, at brief intervals". (Sr. John Chrysostom).

"Prayer is a Single Point such that in Praying for Oneself, One Prays for All".    (Luisa Piccarreta).

TUESDAY, TWELFTH WEEK OF ORDINARY TIME, YEAR I

READING FROM THE FIRST BOOK OF SAMUEL

(Hannah’s barrenness and her prayer: 1 Samuel 1:1-19)


There was a certain man of Ramathaim-zophim of the hill country of Ephraim, whose name was Elkanah the son of Jeroham, son of Elihu, son of Tohu, son of Zuph, an Ephraimite. He had two wives; the name of the one was Hannah, and the name of the other Peninnah. And Peninnah had children, but Hannah had no children.....    
Tuesday of the Twelfth Week in Ordinary Time Year I 

READING FROM THE HOMILIES
ON HANNAH BY ST JOHN CHRYSOSTOM

As Hannah continued praying in the presence of the Lord, says Scripture, Eli watched her mouth. The writer bears witness here to ­two virtues in the woman: her perseverance in prayer and her attentiveness. He refers to the first by saying, She continued, and to the second by adding, in the presence of the Lord; for we all pray, but not all of us pray in the presence of the Lord. Though our bodies may be in an attitude of  prayer and our mouths babbling some pious formula, can we really claim to be praying in the presence of God when our minds are wandering hither and thither in home and market-place? Those people pray in the presence of the Lord who pray with complete recollection; who, having no worldly attachments, have removed from earth to heaven and banished all human preoccupations, just as this woman did then. Recollecting herself completely and concentrating her mind, she called upon ­God in her deep distress.
But why does Scripture say she continued praying when actually her prayer  was very short? She made no long speeches, she did not spin out her plea to great length, but spoke few and simple words. What then could the writer have meant by saying, She continuedSurely he meant that she said the same thing over and over again; she spent a long time ceaselessly repeating the same words. That ­indeed is how Christ also commanded us to pray in the Gospels. When he told his disciples not to pray like the Gentiles and not to use empty repetitions, he also taught them the right way to pray, showing them that it is not a multiplicity of words but mental ­alertness that wins us a hearing.

Why then, you may ask, if  prayer should be brief, did Christ tell them a parable to show that it should be continuous? There was a widow, he said, who by her persistent requests, by her going to him again and again, overcame a cruel and inhuman judge who neither feared God nor regarded other people. And why does Paul also urge us to keep praying, to pray without ceasing? Is it a contra­diction to tell us not to make long speeches, and yet to pray continually?
No; there is no contradiction – God forbid! The two commands are in complete agreement. Christ and Paul com­manded us to make our prayers short, and to say them frequently, at brief intervals. For if you spin out your words to any length you are often inattentive, and so give the devil freedom to approach and trip you up and divert your mind from what you are saying. But if you pray continuously and frequently, repeating your prayer at brief intervals, you can easily remain recollected and fully alert as you pray. That indeed is just what this woman did, not making long speeches but drawing near to God frequently, at brief inter­vals. That is true prayer, when its cries come from the depths of one’s being.


St John Chrysostom, De Anna, Sermon 2.2; (Bareille 8:419-21); Word in Season +++++++++++++++++++.
    



18 May 2015

Book of Heaven, Luisa Piccarreta, Vol. 7. 
May 30, 1907. 
Effectiveness of prayer. Prayer is a Single Point such that in Praying for Oneself, One Prays for All. As I was in my usual state, I saw blessed Jesus for a short time, and I ...

      “My daughter, prayer is one single point, and while it is one point, it can grasp all other points together.  So, whether the soul prays for herself alone or for others, she can obtain by supplication just as much.  Its effectiveness is one.”

Sancta Maria Abbey: http://www.nunraw.com.uk (Website)
Blogspot :http://www.nunraw.blogspot.co.uk, Doneword :http://www.donewill.blogspot.co.uk    |domdonald.org.uk,   Emails: nunrawdonald@yahoo.com, nunrawdonald@gmail.com