Year III, Number 35

Our personal encounter with Christ bathes life in new light, sets us on the right path, and sends us out to be his witnesses. This new way of looking at the world and at people, which comes to us from him, leads us more deeply into the mystery of faith, which is not just a collection of theoretical assertions to be accepted and approved by the mind, but an experience to be had, a truth to be lived, the salt and light of all reality (cf. Veritatis Splendor, 88).

In this secularized age, when many of our contemporaries think and act as if God did not exist or are attracted to irrational forms of religion, it is you, dear young people, who must show that faith is a personal decision which involves your whole life. Let the Gospel be the measure and guide of life’s decisions and plans! Then you will be missionaries in all that you do and say, and wherever you work and live you will be signs of God’s love, credible witnesses to the loving presence of Jesus Christ. Never forget: "No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a bushel" (Mt 5:15)

Just as salt gives flavor to food and light illumines the darkness, so too holiness gives full meaning to life and makes it reflect God’s glory. How many saints, especially young saints, can we count in the Church’s history! In their love for God their heroic virtues shone before the world, and so they became models of life which the Church has held up for imitation by all. Let us remember only a few of them: Agnes of Rome, Andrew of Phú Yên, Pedro Calungsod, Josephine Bakhita, Thérèse of Lisieux, Pier Giorgio Frassati, Marcel Callo, Francisco Castelló Aleu or again Kateri Tekakwitha, the young Iroquois called "the Lily of the Mohawks". Through the intercession of this great host of witnesses, may God make you too, dear young people, the saints of the third millennium!

Q. Dear Fr Anthony,

At the moment I am a 23 year old women working in a full time job... my dream is to join a religious order and to give my life fully to God. I am hoping that in January next year that I will stay with the Missionaries of Charity for a 'come and see' and take God's will from there. In the meantime I feel I am struggling with trying not to get caught up in this world and go back to a lifestyle that I once had. I am weak and I would like some advice in how I can detach myself from the secularism that surrounds me on a daily basis.

Thank you kindly for your time and God bless.

- Anne

A. Dear Anne,

We are all weak, and always weak. The only strength we have is in God's grace. That means that you have to bring his grace into your life actively, depend absolutely on it, and then not be afraid since Christ is the first one to want you to be faithful. This means that you have to make prayer a constant part of your life. Set times aside for it each day, try to go to Mass as frequently as you can and receive Holy Communion. Find a good confessor so you can use the sacrament frequently in order to grow in your life of grace and virtue. Keep close to Mary by praying the rosary each day. Once you take care of prayer, examine the other things you fill your day with. Eliminate the trivial (TV, pointless socializing, any time-wasters you detect) and have some time each day for substantial reading and study of your faith. Then see what you can do for others. Bring the corporal works of charity into your life. (Remember Mother Theresa's phrase, 'do it now'). You should especially make sure to develop good friendships. Look for some other young women who give priority to their faith, so as to do good things together with them.

Hope this helps. God bless.

- Fr Anthony

Intention: For strength for John Paul II in his mission of leading the Church.

Introductory Prayer: I trust in you Lord, yet how often I have found myself trusting too much in myself and my things, leaving you on the shore as I sail and fish the turbulent seas of the world in which we live. Help me, Lord, to truly trust in you, to never leave the shore without you. Lord, especially in those difficult moments of my life when it seems the hardest thing to do, help me to fulfill willingly all that you command me to do; whatever net you tell me to cast out, let me do it with true purity of intention and hope in your blessing. Lord, let me know my mission in life, and grant me the graces I will need to fulfill it.

Gospel Passage: Lk 5:1-11

While the people pressed upon him to hear the word of God, he was standing by the lake of Gennesaret. And he saw two boats by the lake; but the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, he asked him to put out a little from the land. And he sat down and taught the people from the boat. And when he had ceased speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” And Simon answered, “Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.” And when they had done this, they enclosed a great shoal of fish; and as their nets were breaking, they beckoned to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both the boats, so that they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” For he was astonished, and all that were with him, at the catch of fish which they had taken; and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; henceforth you will be catching men.” And when they had brought their boats to land, they left everything and followed him.

1. “Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.”

Why is Peter confessing with such remorse to our Lord? Had he not done as the Lord commanded, in lowering his nets out into the deep waters? The answer is in Peter’s vocation story.

It had all begun when his brother Andrew, a disciple of John the Baptist, came to Simon to tell him, “We have found the Messiah.” Upon meeting our Lord, Simon became his disciple on hearing the words, “You shall be called Cephas.” Now, in the reading we are contemplating, it is curious to notice Peter returning here to his nets and boat. Apparently he once again resorted back to his former occupation instead of attending to the real work that was implied in our Lord’s first call, “Come and see.” At this point, Christ’s original “Come and see” has to be translated into Peter’s life as “Keep coming and you will see.” Peter needs to learn that when it comes to dealing with our Lord, there isn’t to be expected a time where you can say, “Been there and done that; so why come again?”

Peter seems absorbed in washing out fishing nets. Scripture suggests that there was a lesson that Peter needed to learn if he would fulfill his vocation and mission that would be allotted to him by God’s providence.

In the early morning on the lake, Peter and the apostles are tired and distraught after a hard night’s fruitless work. Our Lord seizes this opportunity to form the heart of the man who would later lead his Church. With two boats on the shore, Christ chose to step firmly with both foot and sandal onto the deck of Peter’s boat. Shaking Peter from his dreary self-immersion of washing empty nets, Peter looks up and sees our Lord with a great multitude of people crowded around him on the lakeshore. In this manner Christ took sudden claim to Peter’s boat. We could but imagine his immediate reaction. “What’s going on?” “Why my boat Lord?” “Can’t you see it’s not ready?” “Can’t you see that I am busy?” “Don’t you see the other boat over there, why not use it?” “Why me, Lord?” Often the first reaction we have to God’s call for our life is similar to Peter’s. In essence our self-centeredness erodes our trust and hope in Christ. Without hope, we find it easy to balk at our Lord’s commands. From our weak and distracted hearts our Lord can hear our sulking response, “Go find someone else.” Our Lord persists anyway because he knows that his heart is in the right place and fixed on the mission and not on his emotions. In fact, it seems our Lord is indifferent to Peter’s tiredness and discouragement.

Without hesitancy our Lord makes his choice to enter into the empty boat of Peter. And why not? “The people pressed upon him to hear the word of God.” There is no time to waste on senseless empty lamentations and self centered introspection. The word of God urgently needs to be preached so that later it might be lived by these people and by all nations of all times and cultures. Our times are no different. The Church’s permanent mission is bringing the Gospel to the multitudes - the millions and millions of men and women - who as yet do not know Christ the Redeemer of humanity, John Paul II reminds us.

“Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, he asked him to put out a little from the land.” Peter shoves off from the shore. Will we imitate his example and trust our Lord’s lead? Will we have at least as much courage to push off from the shore of our comforts and embrace the work of evangelization as Christ wants?

2. And he sat down and taught the people from the boat.

In the boat, Peter is captive and has to listen reluctantly to our Lord. If he listens long enough and allows his reason and faith to help him, his present storm of emotions will find calm. And what did our Lord preach that would bring Peter’s heart around? He preached about the Kingdom of God. “The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” Peter’s heart is obviously touched by Christ’s exhortation to repent. And us?

How much of the world is still making its influence on us? Are we still able to listen to our Lord in real prayer and meditation? Have we learned to trust in our Lord and pray in such a way that we conquer the forces of our emotions and all other obstacles in life that don't allow us to “hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.” “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord,” are sincere words of contrition and trust. If we aren’t repentant, we know that we really have yet to listen to the Gospel.

3. “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.”

Those who have ears to hear, let them hear! But we must also do the will of God. It requires our full effort and participation. Anything less would cheapen and lessen the power of the Gospel. “Not all who say, Lord, Lord, will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, but only those who do the will of my Father in heaven.” “Whoever does the will of God is my brother, and sister, and mother.” Knowing his immediate lack of success Peter must humble himself as he is put on the spot before the large crowd to obey our Lord and cast out his nets. Peter knew how difficult it was to say he believed when he had to back up his belief with his actions. He had to obey the word of God in spite of his own recent experiences of having “toiled all night and taken nothing!” No small challenge was before Peter, and the stakes were high; after all, the great multitude was staring down at him waiting anxiously to see what would come of it, and all Peter could think of were the empty nets that he pulled in the night before. Now in the noon of the day, for all the world to see, the crowd looks on and awaits the fruit of Peter’s belief and trust.

With just a glance at Christ he finds just enough courage to say, “But at your word I will let down the nets.” It is echoed by John Paul II’s challenge to us: “Into such seemingly unpromising waters you must cast your nets…, knowing that Jesus alone can satisfy the deepest longings of the human heart.”

Peter trusted just enough to wrestle a miracle from our Lord. “And when they had done this, they caught a great number of fish; and their nets were breaking.” Can we trust our Lord enough to put his words into action in our daily lives, knowing how he will bless even the most meager effort on our part?

That day our Lord preached from the boat of Simon on the lake of Gennesaret. Afterwards, our Lord would change his name from Simon to Peter (the Rock on which he would build his Church), and confer on him the keys of the Kingdom. Our Lord today preaches once again from the ship of the Church where at the helm is the Pope, Peter’s successor. At the beginning of the new millennium of evangelization the Church rides on the immense and wide-open seas of the world. From these open seas she seeks the harbors of distant cities, nations and peoples, preaching once again Christ’s word.

“The number of those awaiting Christ is still immense: the human and cultural groups not yet reached by the Gospel, or for whom the Church is scarcely present, are so widespread as to require the uniting of all the Church’s resources. We cannot be content when we consider the millions of our brothers sisters, who like us have been redeemed by the blood of Christ, but who live in ignorance of the love of God. For each believer, as for the entire Church, the missionary task must remain foremost, for it concerns the eternal destiny of humanity and corresponds to God’s mysterious and merciful plan” (John Paul II, Redemporis Missio).

“The love of Christ impels us.” What will I do for Christ?

QUESTIONNAIRE

To help you to examine your life in the light of the inspirations God just gave you during these moments you shared with him.

1. What practical consequences does my faith have on my life, as regards the things I do?

2. Do I set aside time in my day to pray, meditate, read and reflect on the gospel of Christ in order to keep myself immersed in his ideals and attitudes? Am I humble enough to repent and ask for forgiveness when I find myself straying from what God would prefer I did?

3. What am I doing now in order to bring more souls closer to Christ? Have I explained the faith to anyone, volunteering to teach the young in my parish or in some other fashion?

Repentance for our sins is the fundamental condition needed to validly receive absolution. When it is sincere this repentance involves “a turning away from evil, with repugnance toward the evil actions we have committed. At the same time it entails the desire and resolution to change one’s life, with hope in God’s mercy and trust in the help of his grace” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1431). What is essential, then, is sorrow of soul, compunction of heart: “My sacrifice, God, is a broken spirit; God, do not spurn a broken, humbled heart” (Ps 51:19).

This repentance might occasionally be expressed with tears, tangibly, as in the case of the woman who cried at Jesus’ feet in the house of Simon the Pharisee (see Lk 7:36-50), but this is not absolutely necessary. As you progress and mature in the spiritual life, God allows your life to rely more on faith and love stripped of outward feelings and emotions.

When God allows such external manifestations we should neither reject nor be ashamed of them, but instead thank him and use them to come ever more closely to him. It is certainly not good to look for them or provoke them, since that could be a veiled way of seeking ourselves. What we should beg of God insistently every time we approach the Sacrament of Confession is true sorrow of soul. God has to change our hard, insensitive hearts of stone into hearts of flesh (see Ez 36:26-27). Conversion, and therefore true repentance, is first and foremost the work of God’s grace, which brings our hearts back to him: “Restore us to thyself, O Lord, that we may be restored” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1432).

The amount of time you commit to spending with God during the day will depend on your other commitments, your prior experience in prayer, and the leanings of your heart. Keeping in mind the role that prayer ought to have in your life and any sound advice you can garner from a spiritual director or someone more advanced in such matters than yourself, you should make a realistic but demanding personal program of prayer, just as you would if you desired to learn a new language, or lose weight, or get an academic degree. Here below is a “Recommended Daily Allowance” for your personal prayer intake. Once you have made your program, you will have to exercise your willpower and your faith to live it out; make the commitment to review it every week (Sundays are good days for reviewing your prayer program) in order to examine what changes you should make to it. Promise yourself that you will only make adjustments to your program during your weekly review – that way you save yourself from making whimsical, wishy-washy excuses during the week and allow yourself to form a real habit of prayer.

Three Meals a Day

Our days have a natural rhythm emanating from three nodes: morning, noon, and night. Linking each of these with a at least a few moments of personal contact with God helps keep your “vital and personal relationship” with him on solid, fertile ground.

Morning Offering

In the morning, before the current of the day sweeps us away, we need to remind ourselves of the purpose of our life, to renew our faith and trust in God, and to place our needs before him. This can be done either by a spontaneous prayer, or by reciting a “morning offering” composed by someone else. In either case, aligning our hearts with the meaning of the words sets us on a proper course for the day’s adventure.

Daily Meditation

The kind of prayer in which we use previously composed prayers to guide our attention towards God is called “vocal prayer”. Vocal prayer helps especially when we find it difficult to concentrate, when distractions are numerous and persistent. A lot of people, when they think of prayer, think only of this kind. However, another type of prayer that we should commit to is called “mental prayer”, or “meditation”. This consists in serenely reflecting on a truth of the faith or a passage from the Bible in the presence of God, and extracting lessons and encouragement from it for our own lives. Meditation gives the soul life-giving contact with God’s saving revelation, but requires a heartfelt effort to involve the entire person - intelligence, memory, imagination, emotion, and will. For starters, try setting aside 10 minutes each morning (and/or evening) to spend in meditation.

Midday Prayer

A few moments in the middle of the day to do a spiritual “check-up” can work wonders for our intimacy with Christ. Too often we let an entire day pass without touching base with the most important person in our lives: God. Reserving or finding one or two (or five or more) minutes before or after lunch to renew our faith and trust in God, to thank him for the gifts of the day and beg pardon for our shortcomings, and to ask him for the help that we and our loved ones need keeps us in tune with his will and allows him to act more effectively in and through us at all times.

This can take the form of reciting a favorite or traditional prayer, or just pulling away from the business at hand and spontaneously speaking to the Lord heart-to-heart. You can do it in the car, in your room, in a Chapel if there is one nearby, even on the bus. Personally “expanding” each of the phrases of the Our Father can effectively guide this kind of prayer. “Our Father, who art in Heaven… Dear Lord, I know that you are my Father, that you care for me and watch over me even more than the most loving of human fathers…”

Another clever guide for such brief conversations is provided by the acronym “ALTAR”. A – Adoration: calling to mind God’s greatness, his love, his goodness, his beauty, and praising him for it; L – Love: renewing your love for him, your commitment to do his will, to get to know him and to give yourself to him, since he is the one infinitely worthy of your attention and love; T – Thanksgiving: counting your blessings, expressing your gratitude for his innumerable gifts, especially life, faith, and the little ways he has been present with you throughout the morning; A – Asking: placing your needs and the needs of others before him, asking for light, strength, guidance, help, just as a child asks for help from a loving father; R – Repentance: acknowledging your own sins, failings, and selfish tendencies, confidently asking for forgiveness, and resolving to battle against them.

Snacks

Similar spontaneous recitation of favorite prayers or conversations with our Lord should gradually come to season your entire day. Remember, God “never ceases to draw man to himself” , so he is always present, at our side, wanting to participate in our lives and wanting to fill them with his love, joy, meaning, peace, wisdom, and beauty. Why not take a moment to talk to him when you turn the key in the ignition, instead of turning the radio on right away? Why speak to him in your heart while you walk to and from class, thanking him for the cool breeze, the blue sky, and your healthy joints that you use without thinking? Why not squeeze in a visit to our Lord in the Eucharist sometime during the day and invite a friend to join you – he is there for you, because he wants to deepen your communion with him and lead you to the fulfillment that he has had in mind for you since “before you were formed in your mother’s womb”.

Saying Goodnight

We rarely go to bed without dinner, but how often do we go to bed without saying a proper goodnight to the Lord? It is the best time to thank him for the blessings of the day and ask pardon for your sins, to entrust to him all your efforts, hopes, and frustrations, and to prepare yourself to encounter him again if he sees fit to grant you another day of life. A few minutes to say goodnight to our Heavenly Father and to Mary, our Mother in the order of grace, is a good way for a child of God to end a day lived under the light of faith. It can be as simple as an Our Father and a Hail Mary recited from the heart. Once again, the “formula” matters less than the fact that at the end of a busy and tiring day you put yourself once again under the care of your Creator and Lord, renewing your conviction that only by living in communion with him will you find the happiness for which you seek. Whatever formula you choose for your night prayers, be sure to include at least a couple of minutes to examine your conscience, to reflect on how faithful you have been during the day to your friendship with Christ.

Upcoming Events & Retreats

(( Listed here are retreats directed by the Legionaries of Christ and Regnum Christi members. For a listing of diocesan activities and other events, click here to go to the vocation.com website ))

LEGIONARIES OF CHRIST

Cheshire, CT, October 18-20, Test Your Call! retreat. Contact Br Branigan Sherman, (800) 420-5409. vocation@legionaries.org

Pittsburgh, PA, October 25-27. Spiritual exercises with Fr Anthony Bannon. Open to young men in college. Contact Fr Michael Goodyear, (740) 283-8835. mgoodyear@legionaries.org

Cheshire, CT, November 27 - December 1, Test Your Call! retreat. Contact Br Branigan Sherman, (800) 420-5409. vocation@legionaries.org

REGNUM CHRISTI consecrated men

Call Tony McDonnell for more information, (301) 365-3205. info@ytm.org

ShoreLines welcomes your questions and comments at questions@shorelines.org. If you do not specify otherwise, your question may be posted in the Vocations Q&A section.

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Copyright 2004, Legion of Christ.

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