Become Who You Are
What’s the meaning and purpose of my life? What is my true identity? Why were we created male and female? How do I find happiness, joy and peace? How do I find love that lasts, forever? These are the timeless questions of the human heart. Join Jack Rigert and his guests for lively insights, reading the signs of our times through the lens of Catholic Teaching and the insights of Saint John Paul ll to guide us.
Saint Catherine of Siena said "Become who you are and you would set the world on fire".
Become Who You Are
#539 A Great Time to be Alive! Sundays Scripture And the Last Letter of a Man Condemned to Death to His Wife and Children.
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Jack reflects on the timeless teachings of Sunday's Scripture Readings to help us read the signs of the times!
Witnessing a beautiful sunset becomes a powerful symbol of God's presence, as we explore how His eternal truths resonate in our modern lives. We also confront the disturbing realities faced by children today, emphasizing the moral courage needed to protect them from those seeking to destroy them.
The struggle between good and evil takes center stage as we draw parallels to the persecution faced by Jesus and his apostles. Through insights from the Book of Wisdom and James, and the Gospel of Mark, we reveal how the righteous have always been challenged by the wicked. We delve into the societal celebration of pride, the pitfalls of moral relativism, and the consequences of a life devoid of divine guidance. Urging our listeners to seek divine strength and embrace their faith for ultimate salvation and peace. Join us for a thought-provoking journey that underscores the importance of humility, love, and reliance on God in navigating the trials of our times.
Concluding with the last letter of Blessed Nikolaus Gross (1943) to his wife and children. A father of seven, husband, and journalist who was executed by the Nazis for his outspoken resistance.
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What a great time to be alive with all this craziness. I was contemplating that. You know, in a way I'm getting older. I don't know if I'd want to grow up in this crazy. In fact I wouldn't want to if I was a child, not unless I really had parents and a parish that was really in tune to what was going on and could help me through this. It's a massive array of evil bullies after everybody, after the human heart. It's always been about the human heart, this story.
Speaker 1:But for me, everything that you feel in your heart, all the times that I've studied, all the seeking the truth and trying to figure it out, it always came back down to scripture. For me, it's amazing. Nature, of course, my heart, my human heart, of course, but it was scripture that touched all that. Nature is always giving you clues, like a mystery. My human heart always seeking what is always giving you clues? Huh, like a mystery. My human heart always seeking you know what is the truth, what is good? How should I live? So all those things are working. But then you say you know, how do I make sense of this? And scripture always did it for me Old Testament, new Testament, divine revealed truth. The Catholic Church would call it a public revelation. Public revelation is the Bible Old Testament, new Testament. Divine revealed truth. The Catholic Church would call it a public revelation. Public revelation is the Bible Old Testament, new Testament. So you say, how can the Bible speak to me 2,000, 3,000, 4,000 years later? How could it do that? Because the human heart is timeless. Love God is love is timeless. The truth, jesus Christ. The truth is not a something, the truth is a somebody, and his name is Jesus Christ. That doesn't change when you think about goodness.
Speaker 1:I remember there's a parable that Jesus was talking about the rich young man. And the rich young man comes up to Jesus and said what more do I need to do to have eternal life? And Jesus said sell everything, et know, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And the young man said came to Jesus. Because he said what good must I do? What good things must I do to have eternal life? He knew there was something more. Even though he was a rich young man, he had all the wealth. He still wanted to know more. And Jesus said to him why do you call me good? Because he called him good teacher. He said good teacher, what good should I be doing. And Jesus said to him only God is good, only God is good. So here again we go back to the root. Where does all this goodness come from? Beauty come from All of the creation that we see?
Speaker 1:So I go outside yesterday, on a Saturday, and I said I'm going to have a glass of wine out there. You know, I've been moving, moving, pushing, pushing. I'm going to sit back. I brought the scriptures with me for Sunday and I just felt something. I said there's a lot of the questions going on in my mind, some loose ends right now that I'm working on and I'm going to read Sunday scripture. But first I'm going to just sit back and look, look outside.
Speaker 1:And it was, it was not evening yet, it was probably around four, 30, five, 30 between that time that I was working on some things. So about five, 36 o'clock, I look up and it's very cloudy, getting really cloudy. You could tell fall is coming. You know. The sun is starting to go down earlier and in a little while I look up above me and it's just clouds, gray clouds with black wisps come in and almost kind of like this, this evil that we're seeing around us, you know. But yet I look over to my left and I couldn't quite see the sunset.
Speaker 1:There was a house in the way, so I got up, moved out and it was glorious. The sun was glorious and it was glittering like a jewel. And this jewel was just reflecting. Huh, it was like a joy, and I said that's the Father right there. Thank you, jesus. Huh, thank you, father, thank you, holy Spirit, thank you, blessed Mother, all the saints and angels that are with us. And you realize that you're standing there not alone, that God is there and he's giving me this sign. Huh, just twinkling, just glorious, dancing around and saying hey, I have your heart, I have your back, I'm here with you.
Speaker 1:Yet we know that persecution is here, persecution is coming. So this is a dangerous time. So I said okay, father, I mean, there's people sacrificing their life all over the world right now, yetyrs all over. And he said, yeah, everybody has their place. You may be one of them. At some point we have to be willing to die with Christ and then we're going to rise with Christ. And what does that mean? In this temporal life, it goes like a blink of an eye, and so I'm in awe and wonder of all these things going on. Okay, so I'm going to sit down, I start thinking about some of the evil, some of the destruction is going around and I always get back to this.
Speaker 1:If you ever get confused about this, you know, get back to what's going on with children. You know, focus on children and you see the child in the womb being destroyed. If the child makes it out alive, they're rendered sterile. Their very bodies are being just amazing, just twisted and distorted right, young women's breasts cut off, mutilating the penises and private parts of women. You know, castrating little boys. How do we do this right? Ooh, the mulek huh. Always the sacrifice of the child, the innocent, you innocent. And there's always bullies, fathers and mothers and aunts and uncles just people of goodwill. You can't let these little children be bullied like this in schools and indoctrinated and the goodness of their innocence being taken away. See, evil will always go after the weakest, and I mean just this. It's a bully Think about a bully when you were in school and we have to stand up against that. They're going to go for the innocent, the weak, those are the defenseless ones, and this is what happens first. And of course, a marriage and a family have been twisted and distorted, where sometimes these kids have nobody there. It's amazing when we go out to speak, so I always focus on the kids and I see what's going on and the harm with them. So I turned to Scripture. I said, okay, what do we got to say about all of this stuff that's going on? And this is how it starts.
Speaker 1:We call it the 25th Sunday at Ordinary Time for September 22nd. This is the readings for the Mass from the Magnificat. It's so beautiful and it starts like this it's going to get and I'll just tell you ahead of time preview it's going to get to the human heart. It's going to say that all that evil that we see in the institutions today, all this evil being pushed down from the World Economic Forum all the way through to the local abortion clinic, to your local schools, it all starts with the individual human heart. You can't just blame it on an institution or this or that, because the institution is made up of people. We are made up of people, human hearts, that have been twisted and distorted and evil has entered into that. This is the battle that we're in. This is so clear right now. The weeds and the wheat are battling out. You can go back to another scripture. But let's just go to Sunday. It starts out like this it gives you a little preview.
Speaker 1:At the mass, where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there is a temptation to beset the just one with revilement and torture. So here's the human heart, the body and the soul. Without grace, without redemption, the default position is sin and death. That's the reality. I've talked about that many, many times, so I won't stay there. But you know that when the Redeemer comes in, there's going to be people that will crucify him ultimately. But same thing with us.
Speaker 1:When you stand up, you see Christianity is under a severe attack. Right now, those that are followers of Christ are being attacked. Just like Jesus said, if they hated me, they're going to hate you. If they tortured me, they're going to torture you. If they sacrificed me and I willingly gave up my body, then you have to willingly give up your body for the better good. This is what we do in this world, right? We know this marriage, families for our kids, et cetera. All right. So this is what Jesus reveals to his disciples he is to be handed over to men and they will kill him.
Speaker 1:The disciples respond. Their response, so Jesus just says I'm going to be handed over, I'm going to be killed. And what are their response? To squabble among themselves about who is the greatest. These are Jesus' apostles, so don't feel bad.
Speaker 1:You know we're all fallen. We're all coming out of this story, we're all in this, and you know it's not easy to understand all this stuff. But we got to open ourselves up right so that our selfishness is taken away by the Redeemer, who is God himself, who comes in and totally is the most humble. You know he's wearing a crown of thorns on his head, he's being beaten, he's hanging on a cross naked. Can you imagine, in front of all of these people, the most degrading thing that they can do to you? And he's pouring this out to us and he says at the end I thirst, I thirst for you. He's doing all this. So this is the God right that we worship. You know, the God that we say, that calls us into an intimacy, sons and daughters of God, brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ, to be filled with the Holy Spirit, who is love. I mean, this is our destiny. It's so beautiful and profound.
Speaker 1:But there's a battle going on here in this temporal life, and we're feeling that, of course. And so here's the disciples. They want to know who's the greatest. So where do conflicts among us come from? From where? From our passions that make war within us? Sochnitzin, john Paul II, many others right, the battle always starts in the battlefield of the individual human heart, between good and evil, love and lust. Yet for all our coveting, we don't find satisfaction.
Speaker 1:So Jesus puts his arms around a child to show us that he calls us to be peaceful, gentle, full of mercy, qualities we receive by asking for them. Oh God, hear my prayer. And the entrance to him is I am the salvation of the people, says the Lord. Should they cry out to me in distress, I will hear them and I will be their God forever. This is the story that we enter into, such a beautiful thing.
Speaker 1:So here let's go to the book of wisdom. So this is the first reading Wisdom, chapter two, verse 12, and then 17 and 20. The wicked say this. So think about this. You think, okay, this is the old story. Wisdom came before Jesus Christ. The book of wisdom. Let us beset the just one. Let's go after him, because he is obnoxious to us. He sets himself against our doings, reproaches us for transgressions of the law, charges us with violations of our training. We're the smart ones, we're the trained ones. I got the PhD in education, so don't tell me that gender ideology in these pornographic books shouldn't be read. I know, I'm telling you parents because you're uneducated, right? So we hear all this stuff. Oh my gosh, it's such an old thing. Let us see whether his words be true. Let us find out what will happen to him. You know, just go stand up at a school board meeting.
Speaker 1:This is all of us being persecuted in the name of what's true, good and beautiful, in the name of Jesus Christ. For if he be the son of God, god will defend him. God will defend you. Guys, let's persecute you and deliver him from the hands of his foes. So, with revilement and torture, they come after you thinking okay, you say there's a God, let's see what he does.
Speaker 1:I have the power right. The government, the state has the power. The communists have the power, the Biden administration has the power right to take away your self-defense, your guns, whatever. Because we know, we know, and if God's going to save you, let's see if he saves you. Let's see if we're more powerful than God. Right, let's put him to the test that we may prove of his gentleness. Is he really gentle? And try his patience. Does he really have patience? Let us condemn him to a shameful death, for, according to his own words, god will take care of him. Ooh, the word of the Lord. Isn't this where we're at? Let's see if God well, we know God's going to take care of us in eternal life. That's how I started this whole thing. We know that he's here for us. Will some people suffer? Yeah, will some people be martyred? Yes, jesus himself was this and he says you know, if you follow me, you're gonna be hated.
Speaker 1:This isn't temporal life, it's these v that want to make infinite. They want to suck the infinite that we're given and offered out of the finite. They never connect it like we're supposed to. We were never supposed to be disconnected, like cut flowers from God. And then you say, okay, well, what should I do? What should I do? Well, I get down on my knees and I see this evil. But yet I saw that sun right and I said, ooh, and this is Psalm 54. This is for Mass.
Speaker 1:The Lord upholds my life. Oh God, by your name, save me and by your might, defend my cause. Oh God, hear my prayer, hearken to the words of my mouth, for the haughty have risen up against me. The ruthless seek my life. They set not God before their eyes. Behold, god is my helper. The Lord sustains my life Freely. I God before their eyes. Behold, god is my helper. The Lord sustains my life Freely. I will offer you sacrifice Freely, freely.
Speaker 1:See, the government comes in and they extort your money, extort your life, extort your children, if you don't go along with these gender ideologies, extort the very life of the unborn. I mean always take, take, take, take, take. Always demanding of you. You know how much we're paying just in taxes. It's an extortion. God himself asked for 10% of our tithe and he said I'm going to give back to you 10, 20, 100-fold. The government wants to take 50, 60%. Now, if you add up the thousands of taxes that we pay today for every little thing, everything is taxed, even the things that we don't see, sometimes Gas tax, this tax, that's it. You can buy airplane tickets. Everything's taxed, luxury taxes.
Speaker 1:It's amazing how much they just want to take as much as they can. This Hydra right? This like a blood-sucking Hydra that goes into each person. It's always the child, the poor and the middle class. Right, because the working people, the hardworking people, the people that care about raising families, working hard. They're going to suck the blood out of that, because where else are they going to get it from? They're the rich. They're not going to take it from each other. They want to take it from the poor and suck the rest of it out, and so they can be like gods right Behold, god, though, is my helper, and the Lord sustains my life freely while I offer you sacrifice, just like Jesus freely gave himself.
Speaker 1:God never demands that. He says you have to freely give me your heart, the number one thing. I don't need animal sacrifice, the number one thing. I don't need animal sacrifice. I want your heart. I want to be in union and community with you, so important.
Speaker 1:As I sat out there, I looked up as I'm reading this I will praise your name, oh Lord, for its goodness and I felt that, and I got back up. I had sat back down. I got back up and saw the end of that sun going down, and I just thought, man, I'm just giving myself to you. Fill me, lord, and you feel that right, the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace for those who cultivate peace, and then I just come down into peace and I just sat there with my eyes closed and just meditated on that for a while and then say, okay, so how do you make sense of all this jealousy and everything, right, as I'm sitting there? Ah well, here's the next reading from James. This is all from Sunday's readings. It's so rich, huh. This is from the letter of James, chapter 3, verses 16, going into chapter 4, verse 3.
Speaker 1:Beloved, where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there is disorder in every foul practice. Isn't this something? Take God out of your life that the fault position is sin and death. Jealousy, ambition, selfish ambition, a selfish ambition. But the wisdom from above is, first of all, pure, then peaceable, gentle, compliant, full of mercy, good fruits, without inconsistency or insincerity. It's always consistent. God is the same, I am the truth, I am the way, I am the life. It doesn't change. That's why these timeless truths comes down to us. Right, it's without insincerity. God's always going to be sincere. He doesn't lie to you. See, this is such a beautiful, profound thing, and the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace.
Speaker 1:For those who cultivate peace, feel that peace and then bring that peace into the world. Or selfish ambition and twisting and distortion. I bring that into the world. Whatever is in your heart is going to go out into the world, from your own heart, into your families, into your friendships, into what you do, into your actions or your inactions, to stand up against this evil, which Jesus says is worse If you're lukewarm, I will spew you out. I wish you were either hot or cold. I wish you decided to be evil or good. You stood at that tree. Make a dang decision, because your apathy is the most sickening, revolting thing of all. And how many people are sitting in that proverbial pot of moral relativism and just watching Netflix, binging on Netflix and wasting time on all these social media things, when the world is asking to be saved, huh, and we have to talk about the Savior and bring these poor kids especially it's an injustice being done to these young kids right. So where then? This is? James goes on.
Speaker 1:Where do the wars and where do the conflicts among you come from? Good question Is it not from your passions that make war within your members? Your own passions? This is what I said, right, you covet, but you do not possess. You kill and envy, but you cannot obtain. You fight and wage war. You do not possess because you do not ask. You ask but do not receive. Because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your own passions, right your own desires, your own selfish things. The word of the Lord, why are we out like this? Because our passions are run amok.
Speaker 1:When you open yourself up to evil, evil comes in. I start to do evil, to think evil thoughts, to get into pornography first, maybe you know whatever. A million different things, right Selfishness. Then I start to do evil, or I allow evil to happen and then I become evil. I am evil, or I take the other way. I follow Jesus Christ. I try to let him fill me up in all my brokenness. This is his battle to be one in my heart, but I have to do my part. I have to do my part and the struggle will be in my heart. And I have to become self-sacrificial because if I don't, I'll keep all that selfishness right. And so as I start to think about that, I remember that I read I'm going to put my glasses on here, just reading glasses, just for the sake of everybody out there.
Speaker 1:I made some notes from Father Robert Mateek. He's really good. You think there's no good Jesuits left Most of the Jesuits to me, if I had to describe them, were like the scribes and the Pharisees. They're worldly men, they've thrown out God and they were the worst of the worldly men, some of them the twisting and distortions with the Father James Martins of the world, and really what's so bad about them is that they're taking other souls with them. Look, you can do what you know. You're standing at the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but don't pretend like you're a priest and then you invite people into the church and then you leave them in your brokenness.
Speaker 1:This is not what Jesus Christ does, right? Jesus Christ didn't come to manage your sins. He came with power to bring you into eternal life. But in order to do that, you got to listen to him, right? So the human heart has pushed out God and the satisfaction of all human desires is God. So if I push him out, my heart becomes unquenchable. I can't satisfy it. It's impossible.
Speaker 1:The default position again, with a body and a soul without God, is sin and death. We become lustful creatures, ravishing creatures. They're going to just try to suck again the infinite out of the finite. The endless craving for something more to fill it shows itself in the seven deadly sins. What's the main deadly sin? Pride. We have a whole month dedicated to pride. I'm proud of this. I got the pride flag. I mean one thing, I mean it's in our face. That's why I said I love being alive today, because everything's so clear, it's just around us.
Speaker 1:If you're not living in a proverbial pot and you actually seek the truth, objective truth, you see it so clearly. That stench. It's a stench, that pot, that moral relativism, and you can smell it. But the people that have been sitting in there so long they become so toxic themselves they don't even notice it. Now they're going to the doctor for this and this and that and their addictions, and fighting this and fighting that and this and that, and their addictions, and fighting this and fighting that, but at the end of the day they don't really see that it's an opening out of this horizontal space into the vertical space. So I bring the vertical, the source of divine life and love, into my life. Of course, right, you have gluttony lust. Of course, the individual who is just a body bag of appetites, that hungry shark who's never full, the hungry curiosity of the porn addict, right, just one more click, one more click. Oh, how about this one, oh, one more.
Speaker 1:Sadly, all of us are familiar with this in some way. The old Alka-Seltzer commercials, older people there's this older couple I don't know if you remember this or not. It's funny as heck. And she's trying to fall asleep and he's mumbling. I can't believe. I ate the whole thing. You remember that? You ate it, ralph, and you're going to take a pill to the rescue instead of doing what it's called temperance. Right, so we don't have any temperance today.
Speaker 1:We're trying to fill the infinite desires with all kinds of things, and even exercise becomes an obsession to people trying to fill themselves. Watch, your diet becomes anorexia. Natural beauty of our creation as male and female becomes porn addictions. A great glass of wine becomes alcoholism when the bartender says another one, yes, I'll hate myself in the morning. But young woman who becomes addicted to the need to be loved and reduces it to love without, with a feeling right, reduces love to a feeling and then gives into an act of sex, thinking that sex is going to bring her what she's looking for, with no meaning and purpose behind it. And then, if a pregnancy comes, endless clicks on the phone. Huh. Imagine if you had a culture that was addicted to these quick highs and pleasures that fade and marketing people know. You, look at the Black Friday's Amazon Day the mullet huh, it must be filled.
Speaker 1:Well, what happens now? What happens if evil has gone to every institution like never before Today? This is what's happening today. It's unprecedented what's happening today, because that level of efficiency of that evil has now got into modern science, technology, all our institutions, at a level that it never was able to before. Evil has become so efficient today that we have nuclear bombs that'll destroy all of us, right, and it doesn't even have to break a sweat to reach its quota of human destruction by the end of the workday.
Speaker 1:Every day, satan sets out a quota of how much humanity, how much destruction he's going to have, and it's so easy for him today, right, the most common face of evil is the individual human heart, the appetite that's out of self-control. Me mine, I want this, I want that, I demand this. Socialism, marxism, it's all of that, right, you know, give me the state, it's going to take care of me and, of course, the state promises it. Right, you have Kamala Harris, probably the most corrupt, immorally bankrupt person pushing these gender ideologies on kids, the most pro-abort person that's ever come into existence. It's amazing what happens and we're very close to voting her in as the most powerful person in the world. I mean, you just shake thinking about how much evil will come in from that right. So this is the rise of the bureaucratic state that we see here and these horrendous evils going on all around the world. You know this insanity.
Speaker 1:I can go through one thing after another. Think about the climate alarmism. You know, I saw this video of these two boys, young boys, being interviewed 16, 17 years, and they said well, what do you think about climate change? Boys being interviewed 16, 17 years and they said well, what do you think about climate change? He said well, we have to get rid of farms. I said what do you mean? Get rid of farms? We have to get rid of farms because they're adding to too much climate change. I mean, all we have to do is stop eating and the farms will go out of business. So I think those boys should start right. Don't eat for a few months, come back and tell us what it's like and see what it's like to have without farms.
Speaker 1:I mean this is insanity that young people can't even reason anymore to say, well, how am I going to go to the store to pick up a loaf of bread or make a ham sandwich or whatever I eat, without any place to grow it. It's amazing, right? You know, I saw this green energy thing such an oxymoron In Scotland. They were hundreds of acres of beautiful lush forests being taken down and they're putting up a solar plant and a wind plant. Right, what an oxymoron. Take down all the green trees, the most efficient way to sustain the balance of nature, to build white pieces of metal, you know, with these big windmills and different things, and then pile them up. Our landfills are being filled with them. Nobody talks about that because they only last about 20 years. You would think those blades would last forever. No, it doesn't happen. Planned Parenthood, it's another example of that.
Speaker 1:Right, the globalist plan not to cut down the trees, the living trees, but the living, breathing heart beating little human beings. I mean, think about what's going on today. Okay, so I'm gonna go to the gospel of Mark and you say okay, we see the selfishness, what's Jesus gonna say here? And he warns us again. So, okay, we see the selfishness, what's Jesus going to say here? And he warns us again. So, jesus, this is Mark, chapter 9, verses 30 to 37. And just take a deep breath here. Here's Jesus, our leader, who's going to tell them that he's going to give up his life, and they're going to be squabbling and then think this is what he does.
Speaker 1:At the end, jesus and his disciples left from there and began a journey through Galilee, but he did not wish anyone to know about it. He was teaching his disciples and telling them the Son of man is to be handed over to men and they will kill him, and three days after his death the Son of man will rise. So he's telling them this. Right, so you're sitting there. But they did not understand a saying and they were afraid to question him.
Speaker 1:They came to Capernaum just a little while later and once inside the house, he began to ask them what were you arguing about on the way here? And they remained silent. They had been discussing among themselves on the way who was the greatest, who's the greatest? Jesus is the greatest. Who's going to give up his life? And he just told them that. But no, I'm the great, you know. That's this again. In a way, this is good, isn't it? Because it shows us we're all coming, we're all falling. We're all falling. You've got to work on this.
Speaker 1:Then he sat down and he called the 12 and he said to them if anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and the servant of all. Taking a child, think about this. He took a child, he placed him in their midst, he put his arms around him and he said to them whoever receives one child such as this in my name receives me, and whoever receives me receives not me, but the one who sent me. Isn't that wonderful? Become like the child. Open your mind to God himself. Let him come in and fill us. And then go out into the world and see the other children too, the innocent among us. Put your arms around them and think you know, I have to be there for them, I have to protect them, and I have to become like that, to trust in the Father that he's going to have my best interest in mind. I want to end this with a meditation. It's amazing what happened. So this happened in World War II.
Speaker 1:Blessed Nicholas Gross was a German father of seven. He was a journalist. He was executed by the Nazis for his outspoken resistance. His feast day is January 15th, the day he was condemned to death, and this is just a small piece. This is a farewell letter I want to read that he wrote to his wife and children on the day of his execution or the day before his execution. It's from the book From Dying we Live, the Final Messages and Records of the Resistance.
Speaker 1:This just happened. This is World War II. My dad fought in World War II and he's still alive today. We have forgotten. We sit in that proverbial pot and we forget about this, that these mass, horrendous things have happened all through history once you give up God. But this is what the father writes.
Speaker 1:Now, this father took the side of Jesus Christ. He's got seven kids and a wife and the temptation would have been just to be quiet. Right, don't write about this stuff, don't write about the Nazis. He could have slipped through, right. That's not what he was there for. So he writes this most dearly beloved mother.
Speaker 1:You, dear sweet children, all so he's writing to his wife, calling her mother right of his kids. You, dear sweet children, all this letter, if it reaches your hands, will inform you that the Lord has called me. Your pictures stand before me. I'm gazing long into each familiar face. There is so much I wanted to do for you. There's so much I want to do for you. This is Dad, says the Lord has willed otherwise. The name of the Lord be praised. His will be done regarding us. Have no fear that in the confrontation of death there may be great storm and stress within me. I have prayed daily that the Lord may give you and me strength to take upon ourselves, patiently and humbly, whatever has decreed, whatever he has decreed or sanctioned in respect to us. He's taking that childlike right heart himself, and I perceive what calm and quiet this prayer has brought.
Speaker 1:My thoughts go back to you with ardent love and deep gratitude. How good God is and how rich he has made my life. He has given me his love and mercy. He has given me a dear, loving wife and good children. Do I not owe both him and you lifelong thanks for this? Thank you, my dear ones, for everything you have done for me, and forgive me if I have hurt you or poorly fulfilled my duty or my tasks in relation to you. Especially to you, dear mother, I owe my thanks. When, a few days ago, we said farewell for all of life, I returned to my cell and thanked God from the bottom of my heart for your Christian fortitude. Yes, mother, with your brave farewell you cast a shining light upon my last days of life. The closing off of our deep love could not have been more beautiful or happier than it became thanks to your courageous attitude. I know it caused both you and me a great effort of strength, but the Lord granted us the strength and it's something we must remember. Thankfully, sometimes, during the long months of my imprisonment, I have worried about what would become of you when I could no longer be with you. I have long since realized that your fate does not depend on me. If it is God's will that I should no longer be with you, then indeed he has some other aid ready for you that will work without me. What a letter, huh, what a letter.
Speaker 1:Hey, pay attention, watch for signs, watch for the sun, watch for the ask God for a sign in your heart. Even you know when we ask for signs. You know you've got to remember there's a movement of the heart often that you become the sign. But also all of creation is a sign when you think about the evil in the world and you walk into such a beautiful sunset with the birds singing, with just so much a beautiful breeze and you think how could all this evil come in? Well, I unpacked it today. It comes from the evil heart For those that have rejected God. That's just the reality of where we are. So pay attention, watch for signs and you'll see the signs around you.
Speaker 1:Go to Scripture daily right, rejoice in the Lord, knowing that this is all in His providence. It's winding down to the second coming. We don't know exactly when, but we certainly think it's. I mean, there's no doubt it's accelerating today. I mean it can't be that far away. But you know what? My life it's gonna be a blink of an eye. I'm out of here, regardless of when the end comes, and know that we've been offered redemption, salvation. Those who say yes, those that kneel with our Blessed Mother and say let it be done to me according to your word. We're united to God against those who have rejected him. Yet once again, how many times will they reject Jesus Christ? Huh, it's amazing. Hey, walk into the story. Let him fill you. Make sure you go to Mass today. Glory be to God. Talk to you again soon. Bye everyone.