Dear brothers and sisters, Fiat!

“Lord, increase our faith!” Faith is a gift from God, and at the same time it’s our response, our commitment, our trust in the Lord who fills all things. We have received the gift of Faith in Baptism (remember the lighted candle), Faith that we have learned by our parents and grandparents, by Priests and catechists, in various situations of our Christian growth.

Jesus speaks of a mustard seed … If we have faith the size of a mustard seed, we could transform our whole life. That converted St. Paul. When he wrote to his disciple , through the Word of God, he spoke also to us. ” I remind you, to stir into flame the gift of God.” ” God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather of power and love and self-control.” ” Do not be ashamed of your testimony to our Lord “. ” Guard this rich trust with the help of the Holy Spirit that dwells within us.” On each of these expressions we can feed the good will to build our human and Christian life with faithfulness and true joy.

Jesus then concluded by inviting us to true humility which is full generosity in simplicity: ” When you have done all you have been commanded to do, say, ‘We are useless servants. We have done no more than our duty. “

So, we can see and indicate the model for the Christian, he is called to give witness to his faith, to profess before the world that Jesus is Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God. So St. Paul proclaimed his faith in Jesus Christ before the authorities of his time, at the cost of his life.

To bear witness to the Divinity and Jesus Christ’s love for men, it is necessary that the Lord grants us the gift of fortitude. The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God gives us the gift of fortitude with which we can overcome the difficulties and trials of life and  give witness to the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We need a gift that makes up for the weakness of human nature and that may enable us to resist and persevere.

The Christian life is based on the fundamental decision to adhere to Christ, to follow and imitate Him in spiritual communion with Him, our brother, the Lord and Savior of all men.

In all circumstances of our life, amidst joys and sacrifices, at work and at rest, in the risk and temptation, and even in the painful point of death, the Christian knows that Jesus Christ preceded him and taught him how to go to God.

Luisa, in her spiritual experience, needed so much fortitude especially to face all the difficulties that her path  had. A fortitude whose Luisa understood its origin: from obedience and meditation on the Passion of Jesus.

Obedience is an unshakable wall, and such it renders the soul. Not only this, but in order to be unshakable, it is necessary for one to be strong and robust, and obedience communicates divine strength, in such a way that, in the face of the divine strength it possesses, all things are weak; so much so, that while obedience can move anything, nothing can move it.

The virtues and the merits Jesus acquired for man in His Passion, are as many towers of fortitude on which everyone can lean along the journey on the way to Eternity. But man, ungrateful, running away from these towers of fortitude, leans on mud and conducts himself along the way of perdition.

The Church can not neglect the duty of its testimony. The task of witnessing is undertaken  by every Christian who is disciple of Christ, by reason of the gifts that he received; he is a witness and a living instrument of the mission of the Church; he is called to bear witness to God’s plan in Christ over the entire universe; he must be a prophet of the joy of living and must proclaim with his life, “the admirable works of God.”

Through the testimony of Christians, the Lord Jesus continues to live among men on the path of history, even in our days and forever.

don Marco

The Church’s liturgy celebrates the feast of St. Michael, the Archangel on September 29. His name comes from “Mikael”, which means “Who is like God? “And since no one is like the Almighty, the Archangel fights all those that raise with pride, defying the Almighty. In the Eastern and Western iconography St. Michael, the Archangel is represented, in fact, as a fighter, sword or spear in his hand and the dragon under his feet, symbol of Satan, defeated in battle.

St. Michael is a popular and much venerated Saint. He is mentioned in chapter 12 of the Book of Revelation where he is presented as opponent of the devil and winner of the last battle against Satan and his supporters: “Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon (…) The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him”.

In addition to St. Michael, the Church remembers, on the same day, Sts. Gabriel and Raphael, Archangels. The Bible shows the specific missions of each of them: Michael as opponent of Satan, Gabriel as  messenger, and Raphael as healer.

The figure and story of St Michael the Archangel, show a fundamental lesson for every Christian: it is no not enough to do good to really accomplish God’s will but we must also fight evil. We might say that everyone experiences his fight, determined by factors linked to his own personal history, maturity of faith and external influences. The spiritual combat is an inevitable experience in the path of man, it marks the whole of Christian living, it becomes the criterion to verify the authenticity of the  path undertaken, facilitating its progression.

Therefore, becoming true disciples of the Lord means to experience the spiritual battle not as a negative event to be removed, at all costs, or to endure passively, waiting for a quieter time, but as an event of grace, where we are called to fight, put in place the best of ourselves and accept the defeat with an attitude of faith, recognizing our limits, learning to persevere and hope.

Luisa also had to pass through a terrible ordeal, fighting the demons! A battle that she didn’t fight alone, because Jesus was her strength. It was not her that suffered, but Jesus Himself suffered within her. He wanted to test her faithfulness. He wanted to purify her soul from every slightest spot which might hinder Jesus’ love within her.

That’s why Jesus put her in the midst of demons. He gave them freedom to torment her and to tempt her, so that after having fought the virtues with the opposite vices, she already found herself in possession of those very virtues which she thought she were losing. And then her soul, purged, embellished, enriched, will be like a king returning victorious from a most fierce war, who, while he thought he would lose what he possessed, comes back more glorious and filled with immense riches. Then Jesus will form her dwelling

Therefore, Spiritual warfare, takes place and is consumed inside man’s soul, in his heart, meaning the most profound and intimate place where only God comes. God Himself has made of our hearts his dwelling, even if often He looks sick and in need of healing. Only the Lord can purify the heart from all evil and light it with the fire of his love.

Jesus says to Luisa that He never puts souls in battles so that they may perish; first He measures their strengths, He gives them His  grace, and then He puts them in. And if some souls fall, it is because they do not remain united to Him by means of prayer; no longer feeling the sensitivity to His love, they go begging for love from the creatures, whileHe alone can satiate the human heart.

The thing that an adversary army fears the most is to see courage, strength, and the way in which one challenges the most dangerous fights, without fearing anything. So the demons are; there is nothing they fear more than a courageous soul who, all clinging to God, with a strong spirit, goes into their midst, not to be wounded, but with the firm resolution of wounding them and exterminating them. The demons are frightened, terrified, and would rather flee; but they cannot, because they are bound by the Divine Will, and they are forced to stay, to their greater torment.

The fight makes our life an always active laboratory where, with the help of the divine grace, we are called to work on ourselves, on our feelings, on all those inner movements that we often find it hard to identify and circumscribe, all for increasingly shaping our lives, our thoughts, our feelings on those of Jesus.

Carmela Quaranta