5. A heavenly melody
Two days before
Pentecost, a young man with his wife went to their spiritual father to confess
their sins. They wanted to cleanse their souls from every sin and get ready
spiritually for the great day of the Holy Spirit.
The pious confessor
heard their sins, read them the prayer of forgiveness and blessed them. Then he
took them to sit under a big oak tree with its thick shade. Near them a
bubbling stream ran from the monastery's well, where its murmuring together
with the rustling of the trees made their own sweet melody.
There he found the
opportunity, as an affectionate spiritual father that he was, to teach them a
wonderful heavenly melody. To reveal to them the nicest treasures of the Holy
Spirit, with which they could become spiritually rich and walk their life on
the greatest paths of joy and happiness.
-My children, I'm
so proud of you both because, even though you are so young, you want to learn
how to live on this earth like God's earthly angels.
-My wife and I, holy
father, even before we were married, had decided together to live according to
God the Father's Will. Our desire was to live in holiness and with the help of
our sweet Jesus, to help our children as well, to live like earthly angels. I
never forgot what our catechist told us in Sunday school where we went as young
children.
-What did he tell
you that you cannot forget?
-He used to tell us
that Christ asked His disciples: "Be perfect, therefore, as Your
heavenly Father is perfect" (Math. 5:48). Then I said to myself, as my
beloved Jesus is asking me to do this I will struggle to achieve it. How could
I disobey Him in such a Fatherly request?
-Did you tell your
wife about your desire?
-Yes, and I was
very happy, when she said that she had the same desire, to live as Christ wants
and to be worthy to raise holy children.
-Your words, my
son, give great joy to our heavenly King and I can assure you both, that our
heavenly Father adores you and is proud of you in the presence of His holy
angels. Would you like me today to tell you a few words about my spiritual
experiences, which would help you achieve this more easily?
-Of course, our
holy father. My wife and I would be grateful to you for this.
-In order to
achieve this, my children, you will have to struggle with the help of our good
God to achieve five things, which are the important keys to success. These five
keys each unlock five doors of spiritual knowledge and wisdom, which abundantly
give man the grace of the Holy Spirit.
-I can't wait, our
holy father, to learn about these five keys. My wife and I want to find the
easiest path, to go as quickly as possible into the embrace of our king Jesus.
We both can't wait to experience His motherly affection and His fatherly love
and adoration.
-I will try, my
children, to tell you as simply as possible, so you can remember them. The
first key, which is the most important, is Unity. With this our beloved God
asks us, to always be united with Him with love, trust and obedience, like a
baby is united with absolute love to his mum. This unity will not allow Satan
to get into our mind in order to control and influence it. So, he won't be able
to influence our heart, which is his main target. Because if he manages to
reach our heart and make it his throne, then he has complete power over our
soul.
-What can help us
to achieve this unity more easily?
-Only if you have
true unity between you as a couple.
-But how should we
live to achieve real unity?
-To be the five
rays of love, one for the other. You, my son, should be a husband for your wife
and love and adore her, a father who with affection will take care of her, a
little boy who with trust will rest in her arms, a friend who will discuss your
problems with her and a brother who will feel confidence in her presence. Of course,
the same thing applies to you, my beloved daughter. You will be for your
husband, apart from a wife who will love him, a motherly daughter who like a
mother will adore him like a baby of your heart. But, you will be also, his
little girl who he will cuddle in his affectionate embrace. Be for him a
trusted friend, so he will not need to tell his secrets to other friends and
finally his little sister who will pray with adoration for her only brother. If
you live like this with simplicity, love and humility then you won't have any
secrets between you, because you will live one for the other, like water with
wine. This is the blessed unity of marriage, which allows God to give you
the second key.
-Your words, holy
father, are sweet and make us want to fly like eagles to the highest
mountaintops of holiness!
-That which will
help you fly up high like eagles is the second key of knowledge. It is the Holy
Spirit. Without Its grace man cannot achieve anything at all. Only with the
Holy Spirit can we understand God's Will and to apply it. And only with the
Holy Spirit as our guide can we reach deeply into the infinite affectionate and
compassionate heart of our beloved God. When the Holy Spirit floods a soul with
Its grace, then man can feel the infinite motherly adoration of our heavenly
Father, but also with infinite adoration to fall in love with His heavenly
King. That's why, my children, you must always say the following small but very
powerful prayer: "Our Heavenly Father, in the name of our merciful King Jesus,
flood our humble hearts with Your Holy Spirit and Your divine love." When
God sees you, my children, living with love and unity, then He will hear your
childish supplication and will gradually give you His Holy Spirit.
-How will we
understand, our father, that the Holy Spirit will slowly start flooding our
soul?
-When you become
even much more simple and humble. Then you will be a living source of
spiritual kindness, which won't allow you to criticize or comment on anyone,
but you will be merciful towards everyone. From the amount of your
compassion you will understand how much the divine influence of the Holy Spirit
is affecting you.
-From now on we
will not stop asking our Heavenly Father to give us the grace of the Holy
Spirit.
-This prayer, my
children, will help you obtain the third key. With this, man becomes a ray of
love towards his neighbour. He becomes a universal mother, who loves every
man, exactly as God loves each one of us. This is when man approaches the
perfection of holiness, because our Christ's Will is fulfilled as He said: "Be perfect, therefore, as Your
heavenly Father is perfect" (Math. 5:48).
-Is this key given
to us easily or does it require a special process?
-All the keys
require three things. First of all, is nostalgia, secondly prayer and thirdly
practice and sacrifice. We begin getting all the beautiful things with
sacrifice, but only with sacrifice and practice we can keep them. Practice
is the secret of the fourth key. A practice which concerns the body and the
soul. With the body we make bodily exercises, like fasting, prayers, giving
alms and abstinence. Abstinence concerns the three main forms, by which man can
easily be enslaved by the bonds and wishes of Satan, which are ambition,
avarice and sensuality. Except for the bodily exercises, spiritual exercises of
the soul play a very important role.
-What are these?
-They control your
mouth, so you don't say with your words the poison of criticism, lies,
treachery, slander and others. They control your eyes, so you don't see things
which will poison your soul and leave you with cunning memories. They control
your ears, so you don't hear demonic influences which will badly affect you.
The eyes, ears and the mouth are the three main points upon which you will need
to work very hard, to achieve the purification of your soul.
-We are anxious,
holy father, to learn what the last key is.
-With the last and
the fifth key, God makes us worthy of becoming missionaries to our children but
also to all those people that are around us. It is the key of the Missionary.
With this key you become first with your life and then with your words,
missionaries in your environment. That’s what I wish you my loving children
from the depths of my heart.
-Thank you very
much our father. We beg you to pray to our holy God that we will be able to
carry out all the things that your fatherly love has taught us.
