July Allocutio 2024

With hand in Mary’s trust God’s grace in the face of your weakness

Fr. Paul Churchill, Concilium Spiritual Director

“Simon, Simon, listen, Satan demanded to have you so that he might sift you like wheat” (Lk 22:31). Is it any wonder that Satan would attack Simon Peter? Here is the Apostle who is the first Pope. Here is the leader of that people who have the task of growing God’s Kingdom. Peter must be sifted and destroyed by Satan.

St. Mary Magdalene has a similar story though from a different angle. She is described her as a woman from whom the Lord cast out seven demons. Truly the devil had tried to sift her. But she will the first reported witness to the Resurrection and become, as Pope Francis says, “Apostle to the Apostles”. No wonder the devil tried to sift her.

Another woman of note is Teresa of Avila who led the reform of the Carmelites. In her early years as a nun the devil tempted her to give up praying under the guise that it was the humble thing to do because of her sins. Until she saw the deceit of it and turned back to deep prayer and the rest is history.

Any person or group who are carrying out the work of the Kingdom can expect to be sifted. And if they work with the woman of Genesis they are bound to be attacked by Satan to undo them. As dedicated legionaries who serve Mary you can expect attacks in many forms. And maybe you all can say, “Yes I have this flaw, this bad habit I keep falling into.” “I have this addiction that pulls me down.” But apart from your habitual flaws, which may indeed be your version of St. Paul’s thorn in the flesh to keep you from becoming pride, it is possible for a soul to come under dreadful temptation. So I offer a few thoughts to help you through such spiritual combats.

Firstly God is always on your side even were you to fall badly. Jesus did not reject or discard Peter despite his complete capitulation. He gave him a mission long before his fall and immediately after it. Remember how earlier Peter had said, “Depart from me for I am a sinful man”. But the Lord replied, “Henceforth you will be catching men!” Basically, no matter what the sin, no matter how often our faith or morals seems to fail, God never gives up on us. It is interesting how, just before Peter’s complete collapse, Jesus addresses him, not as Peter, but like a mother who calls her child by his first name, saying, “Simon, Simon”. God calls us all kindly and encouragingly by our personal name, even before we fall and after we fall.

Remember the object of the devil is to get us to doubt God, to be discouraged. Getting us to sin is only a means to an end. He wants to completely break our bond with God. He wants us, like Adam, to hide ourselves from God. He wants us, as he did initially so successfully with Teresa of Avila, to give up praying. But what we must do, no matter what our sin, is to come immediately to him like little children who have fallen and cut ourselves to ask help with our wounds. And we can come because God loves us just as a father loves a small child and has no desire to harm it but to help it.

Secondly we must get it into our heads that the Order we belong to in the Church is, as St Bernard says, The Order of Sinners! We so easily can be like that Pharisee at the top of the Temple who says, “Lord, I am thankful I am not like those other dreadful people I read and hear about in the media.” And then the world today prefers to blot out the concept of sin while man’s inhumanity to man screams out at us. Like St. Philip Neri and others we need to say, since we are no different in nature, “There but for the grace of God go I”. And strange as it may sound, a big fall, while it reminds us that we have no cause to boast, can be turned to gain great graces.

The pharisees addressed the man born blind as a “sinner through and through”. In that they spoke a great truth about us all, sinners through and through. “Oh Father, I know I have my faults but I’m not that bad!”. Right so, up with you to that row with that pharisee in the Temple. I ask if we have some deep serious sins we never even think of like: a) are you ruled by what people think of you than how God sees you? b) do you look on some as objects of contempt and hate or indifference instead of trying to see them through the eyes of Our Heavenly Father? And be wary of that dreadful sin of pride which the devil uses to topple us all. We must all stand with that public sinner at the back of the Temple who said, “God be merciful to me a sinner”. Let us borrow these words from blind Bartimaeus, “Jesus son of David, be merciful to me a sinner”, or from Peter, “Depart from me for I am a sinful man”.

Those last words lead me to my next point. Peter said those words because he was feeling bad about himself. But what God in fact wants us all to do, whether truly virtuous, or caught in the struggle of sinful weeds, or collapsed in faith and morals, is to come to him no matter what. Don’t depart. Keep coming to God. He is our hope. He is not going to abandon us. He can work for our souls what we cannot do for ourselves. Without him we can do nothing, but with him all is possible. “Come close to God and he will come close go you” (Jas 4:8). Let us never forget those words, “Where sin abounds there even more is God’s grace!” (Rm 5:20).

And my final point. Go to God with Mary. She is the sinless one, the Refuge of sinners. Put your hands in hers. Let her bring you to God and speak on your behalf. “Here is your humble servant who is mired in sin. He truly wants to be good, to do your will, to be a channel of your grace. He hears the challenge of the Cross and would love to live it but recoils. Believe you me, having been there, I understand him. Can you help him and give him the grace he needs to become a better person, to become what you want him to be?” O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to you. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us who have recourse to you. Refuge of sinners, pray for us.