Ave Maria Meditations
Peace depends on victory, and victory depends on struggle. If you desire peace, you will have to fight continuously. Your “weapons” in this struggle are meditation, self-denial, the sacraments, the rosary, and recollection. Your allies are Mary, Joseph, the angels, your patron saints, and your spiritual director. Unless you gradually drop your weapons or betray your allies, your victory is assured.
If you are determined to practice one virtue every year, and you practiced it every day, very soon you would make quite an improvement. External and, even more, inner silence is the atmosphere most helpful to the interior life.
You do not have to be educated or extraordinarily talented to become holy. All you require is the grace of God and your own determination. Few people become saints, because it is easier to become educated than it is to make the necessary changes in one’s life to become holy!
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Sacrifice and contemplative prayer go hand in hand. If you do not practice sacrifice, do not complain that your prayer has grown cold.
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While everyone else would say, “This person is s cause of misfortune,” you could say, “This person is the instrument by which I am being transformed.”
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Do not think that your religious life has lost its meaning because you are not permitted to live in community, because you can no longer perform works of charity by educating or assisting those in need. What did Jesus do on the cross? What does Jesus do in the tabernacle? The Lord is present, praying and sacrificing. Can you see what meaning there is here for you? It was at the very moment that Christ died on the cross that He redeemed humanity.
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“Here is your Mother” (Jn 19:27). After the institution of the Blessed Eucharist, the Lord could not have left us anything greater than Mary. She has crushed the head of the serpent. She will help you to conquer the devil, the flesh, and the world. She will obtain for you the graces to hold firm to the noble idea which the Lord has placed in your heart.
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No matter how tepid, sinful, or hopeless you may feel, entrust yourself into the hands of Mary. Jesus bequeathed her to you; how could she abandon you?
+ Cardinal Nguyen Van Thuan
