Through the season of Lent 2006 Scoop will be publishing a serialisation of Katya Rivas’s "The Passion". Readers can sign up to receive the serial by email at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dailykatya/. To order a video about Katya's work see… http://www.apleatohumanity.com/
The Medallion of the Apostolate of the New Evangelization
The Passion
Reflections that Jesus makes on the mystery of His suffering and the value it has on the Redemption.
Cochabamba — Bolivia
Spanish Editions: 1996 and 1998
English 1st Edition - November 1999
The
Passion
Extract 20
Jesus
I am on My way to Calvary. Those wicked men, fearing to see Me die before reaching the end, look for someone to help Me carry the Cross, and from the vicinity they seized a man called Simon.
Look at him behind Me, helping Me carry the Cross, and above all consider two things: this man lacks good will, and is a mercenary because if he comes and shares with Me the weight of the Cross, it is because he has been requisitioned. For that reason, when he feels too tired, he lets the weight fall more on Me and thus, I fall to the ground twice.
This man helps Me carry part of the Cross but not My entire Cross.
There are souls that walk this way behind Me. They accept to help Me carry My Cross but they still worry about comfort and rest. Many others agree to follow Me and, with this end, they have embraced the perfect life. But they do not abandon their self-interests, which keep on being, in many cases, their priority. That is why they falter and drop My Cross when it weighs upon them too much. They look to suffer in the least possible way, they measure their self-denial, evade humiliation and fatigue as much as possible, and, remembering perhaps with sorrow, those whom they left behind, they try to obtain for themselves certain comforts and pleasures.
In a word, there are souls who are so selfish and egotistical that they have come, more for themselves than for Me, in pursuit of Me. They resign themselves only to give what bothers them and what they cannot put aside… They help Me carry only a very small part of My Cross, and in such a manner that they can hardly acquire the indispensable merits for their salvation. But in eternity, they will see how far they have left the path that they should have traveled.
On the contrary, there are souls, and not few, who, moved by their desire for salvation but mainly for the love inspired by the vision of what I have suffered for them, decide to follow Me on the path to Calvary. They embrace the perfect life and give themselves to My service, not to help Me carry just a part of the Cross but all of it. Their only desire is to give Me rest and to console Me. They offer themselves to everything that My Will asks of them, searching for anything that can please Me. They do not think about the merits or the reward that awaits them, nor the tiredness or the suffering that will follow. The only thing they are aware of is the love that they can show Me, and the comfort they give Me…
If My Cross is presented as an illness, if it is hidden under a job contrary to their inclinations and of little agreement with their abilities; if it comes accompanied by the absence of the people that surround them, they accepted it with total submission.
O! These are the souls that truly carry My Cross; they adore it. They take advantage of it, to make sure of My Glory without any other interest or payment other than My Love. They are the ones that consider Me and Glorify Me.
If you do not see the product of your sufferings, of your self-denial, or if you see it later, be certain that they have not been in vain and fruitless, but, on the contrary, the fruit shall be abundant.
The soul who truly loves, does not keep count of how much it has suffered or worked, nor does it expect this or that reward, but it only searches for that which it believes glorifies its God… For Him it spares neither labors nor weariness. It does not become agitated nor restless, far from it, for it does not lose its peace if it finds itself thwarted or humiliated because the only motive for its actions is love, and love abandons the consequences and the results. This is the goal for the souls who do not seek rewards. The only thing that they hope for is My Glory, My comfort, My rest, and, for that reason they have taken My Cross and all the weight that My Will wants to load upon them.
My children, call Me by My name, for Jesus means everything. I will wash your feet, those feet that have stepped on a slippery path and are now wounded by the blows against the rocks. I will wipe away your tears, cure you, kiss you, and you will remain healthy and know no other path but the one that leads you to Me.
We are now at Calvary! The mob is excited because the terrible moment is near…. Exhausted by fatigue, I can hardly walk. My feet bleed because of the stones on the way… Three times I have fallen along the way: one to give sinners used to sinning the strength to convert; another to encourage the souls that fall because of being frail, and the souls blinded by sadness and restlessness, to get up and embark with courage upon the path of virtue; and the third, to help souls depart from sin at the hour of their death.
EDITOR’S NOTES: Through the Christian season of Lent 2006, Scoop will be publishing a series of daily reflections on the Passion from Bolivian author Katya Rivas. Rivas, has received an official imprimatur from the Catholic Church for several books.. Readers can sign up to recieve daily extracts from Katya Rivas's writings by email at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dailykatya/
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