Today
[someone] told me about a [woman] who has recently had a baby.
She . . . is living in hell—her partner is a womanizer and he drinks.
[The person who told me about this] said that he would not wish for
anybody to live such a life. I replied: “All the sinfulness and hell
she lives in can not outweigh the fact that she is blessed with a child.
All the holiness and life in perfection is worth nothing compared to the
gift of having her own child. Even if the child and the mother both suffer
to hell and back.” I told him also: “You see, I don’t suffer
anything like that, but my empty life, filled with religion, is pitiful misery,
compared to what she has been given—despite her suffering.” But
I bet, you would disagree with me. If you bring a child into this world,
you love God more than if you don’t. Children are the gift from God
and are not born to their parents solely, but are given this life to praise
God and to partake in this earthly drama, no matter how tragic existence
may be. Can you imagine that your mum & dad had such abortive mentality
and attitude as you do, and never gave you the chance to live on earth. .
. . And you say that you are a bit of a mystic at heart?!
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 agree that children are a gift
from God. And I know, from my clinical work, that many parents treat their
“gifts” with such indifference and ingratitude that the children
grow up filled with bitterness and
anger, even to the point of
hating God. A fine way of praising God that
is! But this is not the point of your message.
I also know that those persons
who were not raised by their parents to love and to fear God can, through
the hard work of spiritual healing, resolve their
anger and bitterness and learn to love God. But this
is not the point of your message either.
I also know that if I had not
been born, God would have raised up someone else to do the work I’m
doing. The mere fact that I was born does not mean that I
had to have been born. But this is not
the point of your message either.
Anyone can tell, from what you
say, that you are desperate to have a child. Even with all the resources
of the Catholic Church —even with the
Eucharist itself—you feel miserable
because you do not have a child. And that’s sad, because it misses the
point about Christianity. And this is the point of your
message.
Taking the vows of Holy Matrimony
and having children to raise them to love and to
fear God is one way to praise God. But it’s not the only way.
We praise God primarily by
recognizing that, however we came into this world, and despite any pain or
suffering that ever happened to us, we are ultimately God’s creation
and that God calls us continually into holiness and away from
our sins.
And we praise God by
living out this holiness as an example to others,
so that they might see us and, desiring to share in our great
peace and joy, they might be saved from slavery
to their sins as well.
Now, if instead of showing others
your inner peace you show them how miserable you are because you can’t
have what you think you want, you aren’t living your
faith. In fact, you are showing others that you
lack faith. With real faith you will accept everything that God gives
you or does not give you. You will accept it all gratefully, and you will
accept it with the understanding that it is given to you precisely for the
sake of your spiritual purification, to polish out from your soul all the
various stains left in you by your past emotional injuries.
So, accept the fact that God
knows exactly what you need and that He will give you what you need and will
lead you where He knows you need to go. If you resist, you will be miserable.
And what pitiful misery it is, to be miserable even in the presence of all
God’s gifts. But if you cooperate, you will be plunged into the fullness
of the gift of love.
No
advertising—no sponsor—just the simple truth . . .
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