The Sacred Heart and St. Margaret Mary
Night after night I have what I call "the horrors." For three or four nights I did not have them, and I hoped they were finished. However, they have returned. I awaken around 3 a.m., and last night it was not only demonic dreams but also extreme physical pain which tormented. I'm not sure I can endure these. At the time, it seems as if I cannot. While my spiritual director said I could call even in the middle of the night, I do not. I will not. What can he do or say to change the horrors?
Today I told him after Mass that they are continuing. He said to focus on podcasting--the lighter side--of which I have been distracting myself lately. So, I will do as he says, but I cannot seem to express the horror of the horrors! How could he or anyone comprehend what these are like? Last night an apparently nice man (nice looking, respectable) was speaking to me in a dream. His eyes then became read and twirled into small pupils, like tiny kaleidoscope orange-red gems. I looked at him and asked, "Why are your eyes doing that? They look really dumb!" That was the end of that episode. But when I awoke, if I did awake, I wondered if I had been asleep or if that had occurred while awake, and then I even wondered if I had encountered that man during the daylight hours in reality of this world.
Then came doubts of the state of my poor soul. Was it the man who had told me my soul is black, or at least filled with black spots? Regardless, the thought persisted, and it is true that I have had unkind thoughts about people and behaviors. I have been discouraged with those who behave in ways that bring down their souls and others' souls, through just "not thinking." They just don't think! They don't anticipate what their actions or their provisions in supposed entertainment do to other people who have weaknesses. I have been offering myself for such wrongs, and have been trying to learn how to make reparation to Jesus as well as to make compensation. Sometimes the people's actions are small oversights, a lack of simple charity to others, an unwillingness to take the lesser part or the least convenient. But other times the actions are rather major, such as those who offer "bingo" in a deceived notion that they are providing a ministry for the lonely folk out there.
Yesterday morning I once again sat patiently listening to a distressed soul who is addicted to gambling. Her 72-year-old earthly life is one of darkness, demons, and destitution due to a gambling addiction. She is in terrible money troubles with no way out, it seems. To her credit, she goes to Mass and prays daily; she continues to stand on her feet 36 hours a week as a grocery cashier. She has anger management problems in addition to her gambling addiction. She tells me at times she becomes another person--someone whom she doesn't recognize. She owes money to these "fast cash" people who she says are mafia-run, high-interest money-lenders. She can't see her way out.
Well, I reflect, her own parish is providing the means to more of her demise in its "Reunion Bingo" this Tuesday night, complete with encouraging people to dress in Halloween costumes! So, they invite the devil on-site, as well!
Yesterday I offered manual labor and prayers in reparation to the ignorance, pride, and naive stupidity for those who really think they are providing a wonderful ministry. How I wish and pray that they could be forced to spend the hours and hours I have spent listening to this poor, elderly woman pour out her problems. How I wish they could have seen her walk into a "Fash Cash Today" storefront and beg for more time to pay off some of her many debts. How I wish they would read the research which proves that "innocent" Bingo is the leading entrance game for women to become addicted to gambling.
The devil really has a grasp on these folk who persist in wanting bingo at the parish--who, even after the priest said "no more", asked for bi-yearly "reunions." Shall we call them "Reunions for Hell"? I can assure anyone that the woman I listen to with her gambling addiction nightmares is a soul existing in helll-on-earth.
So, I offered myself as a holocaust, for any use made of me in reparation for this ugliness, this murder of others' souls. In the wee hours of the morning I wondered if this is why I was having such suffering of mind, body and soul--or, was it because of my unkind, unloving thoughts of people who seem to be just plain dumb when it comes to thinking through right and wrong? Is my soul black? Is it full of black spots, so many that it appears all black, as I was shown?
Am I not doing enough for Jesus, for His Sacred Heart? Do I not love Him enough? Am I not paying enough attention to Him, not willing to offer enough or suffer much, for His sake and to slake the insults, indifferences and outrages that I and others offend His Divinity? These, too, are my concerns. And I can't seem to express them deeply or adequately enough to my spiritual director, and there is no other human to which to turn. Jesus knows, though, and He understands my inadequacy in love of Him.
Today is St. Margaret Mary Alocoque's Feast Day. Jesus chose her in the late 1600's to receive His messages regarding devotion to His Sacred Heart. I am going to make my personal consecration to His Sacred Heart right here, right now, at Panera where I came to write--to write until I leave for the farmhouse visit to the lovely Catholic family, where we will share a mean and possible do a podcast. There will be laughter amidst poignancy, as their mother (and grandmother) died to this earth two weeks ago this evening.
The other night, Jesus came to me in a dream, also, and He wants something of me regarding devotion to His Sacred Heart. It was not a superficial visit, but I did not know more than that He desires something more. I think He wants people of the parish to consecrate themselves to His Sacred Heart and become more fervant to this end. But I need more specifics and assurances as to what and how. So I will in the meantime make this heartfelt, soul-desirous consecration. And as the sun begins to sink to the horizon, may I survive the horrors if Jesus should allow any more to come. More so, may His Sacred Heart accept my consecration offerings, and bring His peace tonight.
Prayer of Consecration:
"I give myself to the Sacred Heart of Our Lord Jesus Christ, and I consecrate to Him my person and my life, my actions, pains, and sufferings, so that henceforth I shall be unwilling to make use of any part of my being except for the honor, love, and glory of the Sacred Heart.
"My unchanging purpose is to be all His and to do all things for the love of Him while renouncing with all my heart whatever is displeasing to Him.
"I take You, O Sacred Heart, as the only objectd of my love, the guardian of my life, the assurnace of my salvation, the remedy of my weakness and inconstancy, the atonement for all my faults, and the sure refuge at my death.
"O Heart of goodness, be my justification before God the Father, and turn away from me the strokes of His righteous anger.
"O Heart of love, I place all my trust in You, for I fear everything from my own wickedness and frailty, but I hope for all things from Your goodness and bounty.
"Consume in me all that can displease You or resist Your holy Will. Let Your pure love imprint You so deeply upon my heart that I shall nevermore be able to forget You or be separated from You. May I obtain from all Your loving kindness the grace of having my name written in You, for I desire to place in You all my happiness and all my glory, living and dying in the virtual bondage to You."
Today I told him after Mass that they are continuing. He said to focus on podcasting--the lighter side--of which I have been distracting myself lately. So, I will do as he says, but I cannot seem to express the horror of the horrors! How could he or anyone comprehend what these are like? Last night an apparently nice man (nice looking, respectable) was speaking to me in a dream. His eyes then became read and twirled into small pupils, like tiny kaleidoscope orange-red gems. I looked at him and asked, "Why are your eyes doing that? They look really dumb!" That was the end of that episode. But when I awoke, if I did awake, I wondered if I had been asleep or if that had occurred while awake, and then I even wondered if I had encountered that man during the daylight hours in reality of this world.
Then came doubts of the state of my poor soul. Was it the man who had told me my soul is black, or at least filled with black spots? Regardless, the thought persisted, and it is true that I have had unkind thoughts about people and behaviors. I have been discouraged with those who behave in ways that bring down their souls and others' souls, through just "not thinking." They just don't think! They don't anticipate what their actions or their provisions in supposed entertainment do to other people who have weaknesses. I have been offering myself for such wrongs, and have been trying to learn how to make reparation to Jesus as well as to make compensation. Sometimes the people's actions are small oversights, a lack of simple charity to others, an unwillingness to take the lesser part or the least convenient. But other times the actions are rather major, such as those who offer "bingo" in a deceived notion that they are providing a ministry for the lonely folk out there.
Yesterday morning I once again sat patiently listening to a distressed soul who is addicted to gambling. Her 72-year-old earthly life is one of darkness, demons, and destitution due to a gambling addiction. She is in terrible money troubles with no way out, it seems. To her credit, she goes to Mass and prays daily; she continues to stand on her feet 36 hours a week as a grocery cashier. She has anger management problems in addition to her gambling addiction. She tells me at times she becomes another person--someone whom she doesn't recognize. She owes money to these "fast cash" people who she says are mafia-run, high-interest money-lenders. She can't see her way out.
Well, I reflect, her own parish is providing the means to more of her demise in its "Reunion Bingo" this Tuesday night, complete with encouraging people to dress in Halloween costumes! So, they invite the devil on-site, as well!
Yesterday I offered manual labor and prayers in reparation to the ignorance, pride, and naive stupidity for those who really think they are providing a wonderful ministry. How I wish and pray that they could be forced to spend the hours and hours I have spent listening to this poor, elderly woman pour out her problems. How I wish they could have seen her walk into a "Fash Cash Today" storefront and beg for more time to pay off some of her many debts. How I wish they would read the research which proves that "innocent" Bingo is the leading entrance game for women to become addicted to gambling.
The devil really has a grasp on these folk who persist in wanting bingo at the parish--who, even after the priest said "no more", asked for bi-yearly "reunions." Shall we call them "Reunions for Hell"? I can assure anyone that the woman I listen to with her gambling addiction nightmares is a soul existing in helll-on-earth.
So, I offered myself as a holocaust, for any use made of me in reparation for this ugliness, this murder of others' souls. In the wee hours of the morning I wondered if this is why I was having such suffering of mind, body and soul--or, was it because of my unkind, unloving thoughts of people who seem to be just plain dumb when it comes to thinking through right and wrong? Is my soul black? Is it full of black spots, so many that it appears all black, as I was shown?
Am I not doing enough for Jesus, for His Sacred Heart? Do I not love Him enough? Am I not paying enough attention to Him, not willing to offer enough or suffer much, for His sake and to slake the insults, indifferences and outrages that I and others offend His Divinity? These, too, are my concerns. And I can't seem to express them deeply or adequately enough to my spiritual director, and there is no other human to which to turn. Jesus knows, though, and He understands my inadequacy in love of Him.
Today is St. Margaret Mary Alocoque's Feast Day. Jesus chose her in the late 1600's to receive His messages regarding devotion to His Sacred Heart. I am going to make my personal consecration to His Sacred Heart right here, right now, at Panera where I came to write--to write until I leave for the farmhouse visit to the lovely Catholic family, where we will share a mean and possible do a podcast. There will be laughter amidst poignancy, as their mother (and grandmother) died to this earth two weeks ago this evening.
The other night, Jesus came to me in a dream, also, and He wants something of me regarding devotion to His Sacred Heart. It was not a superficial visit, but I did not know more than that He desires something more. I think He wants people of the parish to consecrate themselves to His Sacred Heart and become more fervant to this end. But I need more specifics and assurances as to what and how. So I will in the meantime make this heartfelt, soul-desirous consecration. And as the sun begins to sink to the horizon, may I survive the horrors if Jesus should allow any more to come. More so, may His Sacred Heart accept my consecration offerings, and bring His peace tonight.
Prayer of Consecration:
"I give myself to the Sacred Heart of Our Lord Jesus Christ, and I consecrate to Him my person and my life, my actions, pains, and sufferings, so that henceforth I shall be unwilling to make use of any part of my being except for the honor, love, and glory of the Sacred Heart.
"My unchanging purpose is to be all His and to do all things for the love of Him while renouncing with all my heart whatever is displeasing to Him.
"I take You, O Sacred Heart, as the only objectd of my love, the guardian of my life, the assurnace of my salvation, the remedy of my weakness and inconstancy, the atonement for all my faults, and the sure refuge at my death.
"O Heart of goodness, be my justification before God the Father, and turn away from me the strokes of His righteous anger.
"O Heart of love, I place all my trust in You, for I fear everything from my own wickedness and frailty, but I hope for all things from Your goodness and bounty.
"Consume in me all that can displease You or resist Your holy Will. Let Your pure love imprint You so deeply upon my heart that I shall nevermore be able to forget You or be separated from You. May I obtain from all Your loving kindness the grace of having my name written in You, for I desire to place in You all my happiness and all my glory, living and dying in the virtual bondage to You."
posted by The Catholic Hermit | 1:28 PM
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