Our primary responsibility, the main object of all our efforts, must be the transformation of ourselves, of our hearts and our lives. Insofar as we succeed at this, we promote the spreading of God’s kingdom for by doing this, we are at the same time disposing ourselves to help others and contribute even further to the spreading of the kingdom. What this means in the concrete is that each of us must faithfully fulfill the duties of our daily life.
The circumstances and people that God each day presents to us through his providence offer us the opportunity to perform action after action in proof of our dedication to the kingdom. Whether we are married and taking care of home and family, or studying in school, or working in an office or a factory or on a farm, whether we are dedicated to the priestly or religious life, matters little. In whatever we do, we must always seek first the kingdom of God. That is, all of our actions of every day must be accepted as from God and referred back to him, must be done in a way that fulfills his will, for in this way alone is the kingdom of God promoted and spread upon earth.
Fr. Walter J. Ciszek, S.J.
Father Walter Ciszek authored the books : He Leadeth Me and With God in Russia. He survived the Siberian Gulag. This holy Jesuit was born in 1904 and died in 1984 on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. He was ordained in 1937 and granted his great desire to go as a priest to Russia. Later he would be captured and convicted as a ‘spy’ and sent to Siberia. There in that place of suffering, he was a priest to those sent there. He would finally be released in 1955 and was able to get word to his family with whom he had not been able to contact since 1939. He would not be able to return to the United States until 1963. Through all his years of suffering, he learned to trust totally in the Providence of God in every situation; it was a lesson learned the hard way.
