Katya Rivas: Benefits That Come From Affliction

Wednesday, 17 July 2002, 9:36 am
Column: Katya Rivas

The Medallion of the Apostolate of the New Evangelization

The Door to Heaven - Extracts

A teaching for Man,
about his weaknesses,
limits and reach.

Cochabamba — Bolivia
Spanish Editions: 1996 and 1998
English Edition 1.1 - July 1999

The Door to Heaven – Extract No. 38.2

From Door To Heaven - Introduction

“At Jesus’ request, the "Prayer Groups" of Cochabamba and La Paz were to join forces and work together. The people responsible for the group… received a great and wonderful surprise when Jesus announced to Catalina that He would dictate the subject matter and context of the Retreat… The Messages in DH-38 correspond to the aforementioned experience. No one could have expected such a Grace.”

In times of affliction, I enrich the souls I love, with My greatest Graces. See John the Baptist who, chained and cramped in jail, knew of the work I did. You do not understand it, but there is great and invaluable usefulness obtained from affliction. I do not send them to you because I want you to be harmed, but because I desire your well being, and because of this, you must receive them when I send them. And also thank Me, not only submitting to My divine Will, but rejoicing because I treat you as My Father treated Me, since My life in the world was a web of pain and sorrow. I will explain in detail:

First you will see why afflictions are useful. He who has not been tempted, what can he know? He who has a lot of experience, will be reflective and he who has learned a lot, will meditate with prudence. He who has always lived in prosperity, in comfort, does not know anything about the state of his soul. The first good effect of affliction is to open eyes that prosperity has kept closed. Saint Paul was blind when I appeared before him and then he understood the mistakes in which he lived. King Manases turned to Me when he was in jail in Babylon, he knew about his sins and made penance for them. Think about the Prodigal Son... So it is that while they live in prosperity, they only think about the world and moral corruption.

The second good benefit from affliction is to separate them from their fondness for worldly things. When the mother wants to wean her nursing child, she puts something bitter on the nipple so the child withdraws and gets used to eating. I do the same with you to separate you from worldly riches: I make worldly riches bitter so you will abhor them and love heavenly riches. I make worldly riches bitter so that you will seek another happiness, whose sweetness will not deceive you.

The third good benefit is that those who live in prosperity, stimulated by presumption, vaingloriousness, pride, the immoderate desire to acquire riches, honors and pleasures, are freed from all these temptations by means of afflictions. They make them humble to be content with the state and condition in which I have placed them. I send afflictions so they will not be condemned together with this world.

The fourth benefit is to make amends for any sins committed, much better than the penance you impose on yourselves voluntarily. What an efficient remedy suffering is to cure wounds and injuries opened by sins! Why do you complain? The affliction you suffer, as Saint Augustine said, is a medicine, not a punishment. Job calls a man whom I Myself correct fortunate, because I make the wound and heal it: I hurt and cure with My hands.

The fifth benefit is that pains remind you of Me and force you to turn to My Mercy, seeing that only I am the One who can relieve you and help you when you suffer (Matthew 11,28).

The sixth benefit is that affliction makes you acquire great merits before Me, giving you an opportunity to exercise the virtues that I love the most: humility, patience and acceptance of My Will. Do not forget that a "Thanks be to God" is worth more than a thousand thanksgivings in prosperity.

My Children, what a treasure of merits that a Christian obtains when he patiently suffers scorn, poverty and sickness. Scorn received by men is the true desire of saints who wish to be scorned for their love for Me, to resemble Me. How much they gain by suffering the discomforts of poverty! If you believe you are unhappy because poverty lives with you, you are truly unhappy and worthy of compassion, not because you are poor, but because in being poor you do not embrace your poverty and you consider yourself unfortunate.

To suffer pain and sickness patiently is to reach in advance a great part of the crown prepared for you in Heaven. If a sick man complains that because of his illness he can do nothing, he is wrong; because he can do everything, by offering God all his suffering with peace and acceptance. I punish whom I love and test those whom I receive as My children with misfortunes (Hebrews 12,6). One day I told Saint Therese: You must know that the souls My Father loves the most, are those who suffer the greatest afflictions. Learn from Job, who said: "If we have received good things from the hand of the Lord, why should we not receive also the bad?" Do you think it is unfair that he who received with joy life, health, temporary riches, should also receive sufferings, which are more useful and beneficial than prosperity? My beloved daughter, a soul strengthened by suffering, is like a flame that grows with the wind.

We will continue later... Thank you, beloved one.

Later that same day:

The more dreadful afflictions for a good soul are the temptations with which the devil incites us to offend God; but he who resists them and suffers them, imploring for divine help, acquires with them a great treasure of merits. In 1st Corinthians 10,13 read: "And God is faithful and will not let you be tried beyond your strength; but with the trial he will also provide a way out, so that you may be able to bear it." And in happiness, that you like so much, I tell you that those who cry will be comforted.

If you do not suffer afflictions with patience, your state will not be improved and danger will be greater. The only thing you can do, if you want to be saved, is to undergo many sufferings to enter My Kingdom. Do not forget that Paradise is for the poor, the humble and the afflicted.

In short, I want you to understand that afflictions, with which I test or correct you, are not for your perdition, but for your benefit or correction. When a sinner is afflicted, it is a sign that I want to have Mercy on him in the other life. On the contrary, unfortunate is he who is not touched by Me in this world, because it is a sign that I am discontent with him and reserve him for eternal punishment. The Prophet Jeremiah asked: "Lord, why do the impious prosper in everything in this world?" (Jeremiah 12,1).

When you are surrounded by suffering sent by Me, pray like Job; pray like Saint Augustine, who said: "Lord, burn, tear and do not forgive in this world, so you will forgive me in the other, which is eternal." That is why, whoever in this world is afflicted by God, has a sure sign of My Love. Whoever wants to be glorified with the Saints, must suffer in this life as the saints suffered. None of them has been well treated nor wanted by the world, but all were persecuted.

Well, I will tell you how you must behave while suffering. He who is assailed by sufferings in this world needs, above all, to move away from sin and try to be in God’s grace. If not, all that he suffers while being in sin, will be lost for him. That is, without grace, suffering would be of no benefit. On the contrary, whoever suffers with Me and by Me, with resignation, all his suffering will turn into consolation and joy. That is why My Apostles, after being offended and mistreated by the Jews, retreated with joy from the presence of the council, because they had been worthy of suffering in My Name.

So, when I send you an affliction, you must say as I do. The chalice, given to Me by My Heavenly Father, must I let this pass? Because, besides receiving affliction as something that comes from My hand, what is the patrimony of the Christian in this world but affliction and persecution? I have died on a Cross, and My Apostles suffered cruel martyrdom. Will you call yourself My imitators, when you do not know how to suffer patiently and with resignation?

Whenever you are afflicted and do not know what to do, turn to Me, for I am the only One who can comfort you. Come to Me with great trust in My Heart which is full of Mercy, and not like those who are downcast if I do not hear them as soon as they begin to beg. For these I said to Peter: Man of little faith, why have you doubted? When the graces you wish to obtain are spiritual and may be of benefit to your souls, you must be sure that I will hear as long as you pray with tenacity and as long as you do not lose your faith. Therefore, it is necessary that in suffering you never doubt that Divine Mercy will comfort you. Souls of little faith, instead of turning to Me in times of affliction, turn to human means, and even satanic means such as witches and soothsayers, forgetting to come to Me, and cannot see themselves helped in their needs. If I am not who builds the house, architects tire themselves in vain. Why did men make Me angry by turning their backs on Me and kneeling before idols in which they put their hope? Why do they say they do not want to come to Me? By chance have I been an overcast land that yields no fruit for you? Do not you know My greatest desire is for you come to Me for consolation during your afflictions; so I can give you My Graces and, at the same time, let you know that when you pray to Me I do not have to be asked twice. I am ready to assist and comfort, although many times not in the way you desire.

I do not sleep when you turn to Me and ask Me for some graces that are useful for your souls, because then I hear that you care about your well-being. Be sure that when you ask Me for temporary graces, either I will give you what you ask for, or I will give you something better; either I will grant you the grace you have asked for as long as it will benefit your soul, or other graces more useful. For example, acceptance with resignation of My Will and patience to suffer that affliction. All this increases merits for eternal life.

My children, there is so little time left for My return. Do not faint in all kinds of persecutions, be grateful for temporary afflictions... You do not know how much I love you! I do not want to lose you for all eternity! Believe Me that with every pain of a chosen one, I suffer too, but I suffer with love, knowing that I am saving you...

(continues…)

….EXTRACT CONCLUDES….

EDITOR’S NOTE: Through the rest of 2002, Scoop will be publishing a series of daily reflections on spiritual matters from Bolivian author Katya Rivas. Rivas, has received an official imprimatur from the Catholic Church for several books she says she was instructed to write by Jesus Christ, Mary and various Angels. Scoop’s extract, above, comes from Rivas’s book “The Door to Heaven”. In 1999 Katya Rivas was the subject of a top-rating documentary show hosted by Mike Willessee (see Scoop TV review - Jesus Christ Tells FOXNews He Wants To Hug World and Scoop Images ). More recently Rivas says she was instructed by Jesus to have her books translated and published on the internet with the intention of having the books distributed to as wide an audience as possible. Several of the books can now be read online at http://www.greatcrusade.org/, and more are coming soon.

COPYRIGHT NOTICE: “Copyright© 2000 by The Great Crusade of Love and Mercy. All rights reserved. This book is published in coordination with The Apostolate of the New Evangelization. Permission is granted to reproduce this book as a whole in its entirety with no changes or additions and as long as the reproduction and distribution is done solely on a non-profit basis. This document is available at no cost online and can be downloaded and printed from the following Web Sites: in English at: http://www.greatcrusade.org and Spanish at: http://www.grancruzada.org …Please copy and distribute this book”.

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The Great Crusade of Love and Mercy

Each year as an part of an observance of Lent Scoop.co.nz publishes a serialisation of Katya Rivas's book "The Passion".

Katya Rivas's work was the subject of a documentary made in 1999 by Australian's Ron Tesoriero and Mike Willissee called "Signs from God" ( read a review here ). In the same year the then Bishop of Buenos Aires Jorge Bergoglio - now Pope Francis - requested a scientific investigation of a remarkable and unexplained phenomena involving a discarded host which had started to bleed. In 2013 Ron Tesoriero published a book "Unseen : New Evidence" which addresses what happened with this investigation and its implications for the quest to discover the origin of life. ( Find out more here ).

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