List of points

Rest assured: when you work for God, there are no difficulties that cannot be overcome, nor discouragements that will make you abandon the task, nor failures worthy of the name, however unfruitful the results may seem.

People from different countries, different races, and very different backgrounds and professions… When you speak to them about God, you become aware of the human and supernatural value of your vocation as an apostle. It is as if you are re-living, in its total reality, the miracle of the first preaching of Our Lord’s disciples. Phrases spoken in a strange tongue, which open up new ways, have been heard by each one, in the depth of his heart in his own language. And in your mind you can see that scene taking on a new life, in which “Parthians, Medes and Elamites” have come joyfully to God.

An indispensable requirement in the apostolate is faith, which is often shown by constancy in speaking about God, even though the fruits are slow to appear.

If we persevere and carry on in the firm conviction that the Lord wills it, signs of a Christian revolution will appear around you, everywhere. Some will follow the call, others will take their interior life seriously, and others — the weakest — will at least be forewarned.

Days of real excitement: three more people!

The words of Jesus are being fulfilled: “My Father’s name has been glorified if you yield abundant fruit and prove yourselves my disciples.”

Vocations, Lord, more vocations! It doesn’t matter whether I did the sowing or someone else: it was You, Jesus, who sowed the seed with our hands! All I know is that you have promised that the fruit will ripen; et fructus vester maneat — and your fruit will endure.

The Lord wants a definite apostolate from you, such as catching those one hundred and fifty-three big fish — not others — taken on the right-hand side of the boat.

And you ask me: How is it I know myself to be a fisher of men, can live in contact with many companions, and be able to distinguish to whom I should direct my specific apostolate, but still catch nobody? Is it Love that is lacking? Do I lack interior life?

Listen to the answer from Peter’s lips, on the occasion of that other miraculous draught: —“Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.”

In the name of Jesus Christ, begin again. —And being strengthened, rid yourself of that indolence!

When you work in apostolic enterprises, do not build for the present alone… Dedicate yourself to these tasks with the hope that others — brothers of yours sharing the same spirit as you — may reap what you are now sowing abroad, and may crown the buildings for which you are now laying the foundations.

That priest, a friend of ours, worked away while thinking of God, holding on to his paternal hand and helping others to make these fundamental ideas their own. That is why he said to himself: “When you die, all will be well, because He will continue to look after things.”

Speaking badly of others is the daughter of envy; and envy is where the sterile seek refuge.

So, now you are faced by sterility, examine the way you see things. If you carry on working and do not get annoyed at others who are also working and obtaining results, then the sterility of your effort will merely be an apparent one. In time you will gather the harvest.