List of points

You owe such a great debt to your Father-God! He has given you life, intelligence, will… He has given you his grace: the Holy Spirit; Jesus, in the Sacred Host; divine sonship; the Blessed Virgin, the Mother of God and our Mother. He has given you the possibility of taking part in the Holy Mass; and he grants you forgiveness for your sins. He forgives you so many times! He has given you countless gifts, some of them quite extraordinary…

Tell me, my son: how have you corresponded so far to this generosity? How are you corresponding now?

Coming closer to God means being ready to be converted anew, to change direction again, to listen attentively to his inspirations — those holy desires he places in our souls — and to put them into practice.

How villainous has been my behaviour and how unfaithful I have been to God’s grace!

—My Mother, Refuge of sinners, pray for me. May I never again hinder God’s work in my soul.

So close to Christ for so many years and… such a sinner!

—Does that intimate love of Jesus for you not make you sob?

Lazarus rose because he heard the voice of God and immediately wanted to get out of the situation he was in. If he hadn’t wanted to move, he would just have died again.

A sincere resolution: to have faith in God always; to hope in God always; to love God always… he never abandons us, even if we are rotting away as Lazarus was.

“Blessed be God!” you said to yourself after having finished your sacramental Confession. And you thought: it is as if I had just been born again.

You then continued calmly: “Domine, quid me vis facere? — Lord, what would you have me do?”

—And you yourself came up with the reply: “With the help of your grace I will let nothing and no one come between me and the fulfilment of your most Holy Will: Serviam — I will serve you unconditionally!”

Jesus was born in a cave in Bethlehem because, Sacred Scripture tells us, “there was no room for them in the inn.”

—I am not departing from theological truth when I say that Jesus is still looking for shelter in your heart.

It is true that your contribution is nil and that it is God who does everything in your soul.

—However, let not this be the case as far as your correspondence to his grace is concerned.

You know that you will never lack God’s grace, because he has chosen you from all eternity. And if this is what he has done for you, he will grant you all the help you need to be faithful to him as his son.

—Go forward, then, with assurance and try to respond at every moment.

You were still rather hesitant when you were telling me: “I am deeply aware of the occasions when the Lord is asking more of me.”

—All I could think of was to remind you how you used to assure me that the only thing you wanted was to identify yourself with him. What’s keeping you back?

Jesus is asking you to pray … You see this very clearly.

—Nonetheless, how poor your response has been! Everything is a great effort for you: you are like a baby who is too lazy to learn to walk. But in your case it isn’t just laziness. It is fear, too, and a lack of generosity!

Looking on the immense panorama of souls who are awaiting us, and being struck by the wonderful and awesome responsibility before us, you may at times have asked yourself, as I have: “Can I contribute anything, when the task is so vast? I, who am so puny?”

—It is then we have to open the Gospel and contemplate how Jesus cures the man born blind. He uses mud made from the dust of the earth and saliva. Yet this is the salve which brings light to those blind eyes!

That is what you and I are. Fully aware of our weaknesses and our worthlessness, but with the grace of God and our good will, we can be salve to give light and provide strength for others as well as for ourselves.