Conversion

PRESENCE OF GOD - O Lord, You have created me for Yourself; grant that, with all my strength, I may tend toward You, my last end.

MEDITATION

1. In the Epistle of today’s Mass (Ez 34,11-16), we read: “For thus saith the Lord God : Behold I Myself will seek My sheep, and will visit them...and will deliver them out of all the places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.... I will bring them to their own land, and I will feed them in the mountains of Israel.... There shall they rest on the green grass.” This is the program which the Lord wishes to accomplish in our souls during the holy season of Lent, in order to lead us by means of it to a life of higher perfection and closer intimacy with Him. He stretches out His hand to us, not only to save us from dangers, but also to help us climb to those higher places where He Himself will nourish us.

The point of departure which will make the realization of this divine plan possible is a new conversion on our part: we must collect our powers, desires, and affections, which have been scattered and are lingering in the valley of the purely human; putting them all together, we must make them converge on God, our one last end. In this sense, our Lenten conversion should consist in a generous determination to put ourselves more resolutely in the way of perfection. It means a new determination to become a saint. The desire for sanctity is the mainspring of the spiritual life; the more intense and real this desire is in us, the more it will urge us to pledge ourselves totally. In this first week of Lent, we must try to arouse and strengthen our resolution to become a saint. If other efforts in the past have been unsuccessful or have not entirely reached the goal, this is no reason for discouragement. Nunc coepi— “now have I begun,” or rather: “now I begin”; let us repeat it humbly, and may the experience of our past failures make us place our trust in God alone.

2. St. Thomas teaches that “in the pursuit of the end, no limits should be set” (IIa IIe, q.184, a.3). Sanctity is the end of the spiritual life; that is why we must propose it to ourselves, not in a reduced, restricted manner, but in all its fullness—fullness which speaks to us of intimate union with God, of the complete invasion of grace, and of entire conformity to the divine will, to the extent that it becomes the only motive of all our actions; for when the soul becomes totally purified of everything contrary to God’s will, “ then the Lord will communicate His supernatural Being to it, in such a way that it will seem to be God Himself and to have what God possesses” (AS II, 5,7). Sanctity is the plenitude of love and grace; it is transformation in God by love, it is deification by grace.

What measure of love and grace must we attain? That depends primarily upon God’s designs on our soul and then on our cooperation. Now on our part, the secret of reaching the goal is never to stop: first, because even if we were to grow in love indefinitely, we would never be able to love God as much as He is to be loved; secondly because we do not know to what degree of sanctity God is calling us. Furthermore, God does not let Himself be outdone in generosity, and the more we give ourselves to Him in the exercise of intense love, the more He will give Himself to us by grace.

The measure of loving God is to love Him “without measure”; if we should not set a limit to love, neither should we set one to our conversion. The Lord said, “Be converted to Me with all your heart” (Jl 2,12). This is the indispensable condition for loving God with our whole heart. The cases where total conversion is reached in an instant by a very special grace are rare; ordinarily, we do not arrive at it except by a daily progressive conversion. And if, in this conversion—as in the whole work of sanctification—the initiative is always from God, who prevents us with His grace, our cooperation is nevertheless required; hence we must strive every day with renewed diligence to “be converted to God with all our heart.” Let this be our program for Lent.

COLLOQUY

“O Lord of my soul and my only ‘good! Why do You not wish that the soul should enjoy at once the consolation of arriving at this perfect love as soon as it has decided to love You and is doing all it can to give up everything in order to serve You better? But I am wrong: I should have made my complaint by asking why we ourselves have no desire to arrive at it, for it is we alone who are at fault in not at once enjoying so great a dignity. If we attain to the perfect possession of this true love of God, it brings all blessings with it. But so niggardly and so slow are we in giving ourselves wholly to God that we do not prepare ourselves to receive this benefit.... So it is that this treasure is not given to us in a short time because we do not give ourselves to God entirely and forever.... O my God, grant me the grace and the courage to determine to strive after this good with all my strength. If I persevere, You, who never refuse Your help to anyone, will strengthen my courage until I come off with victory. I say courage, because the devil, with so many obstacles, tries to make us deviate from this path” (cf. T.J. Life, 11).

Grant, O Lord Jesus, by the infinite merits of Your passion, that I may be converted to You with all my heart. Do not permit me to be discouraged by the continual return of my egotistical tendencies, or by the incessant struggle which I must maintain against them. Make me clearly understand that, if I wish to be completely converted to You, I can never make peace with my weaknesses, my faults, my self-love, my pride. Make me understand that I must sacrifice everything to Your love, and even when I have sacrificed everything I must still say : “ I am an unprofitable servant, ” O Lord, because everything is as nothing, compared with the love which You deserve, O infinitely lovable One!