Polish Bishops Conference
COURAGE to follow Jesus
Pastoral Letter of the Polish Bishops on Consecrated Life Day - February 2, 2011 (opubl. 01/26/2011)
brothers and sisters in Christ! Another
Consecrated Life Day, celebrated every year as the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, is a special opportunity to thank God for the gift that the whole Church is the religious life in its different forms and sizes. It is also an encouragement to express gratitude for all the good that we have experienced and still we experience through prayer and work of consecrated persons. Do not, however, at the very poprzestańmy thanksgiving. Think about it, how it relates to religious life and touches each and every one of us, because it is not a matter of only a small group of Christians. Religious life was data for all of us, we enjoy its benefits and blessings, but we did not care for, protected and supported them.
monks and nuns do not take yet nowhere. They are the fruit of living faith, fervent prayer and witness of Christian life in families, parishes, and in all other communities of the Church. For although each monastic vocation is always undeserved grace of God given sinful man, yet all of us, whether we ask for this grace, if we will it open and ready to accept it. May the Lord God has awakened in us the desire to live the faith to our families, parishes and communities have become friendly environment for the creation and development of religious vocations.
first Hit the road for Jesus
When the Lord Jesus began the realization of his vocation, he left the family home and hit the road. He started to go to Jordan, where the crowd came together to listen to the teachings and receive the baptism of repentance from John the Baptist. Then he went into the desert to survive there a kind of retreat. His victory the devil tempting him, it was an experience by which God gives to everyone who entrusted to him alone, and only in him, puts his trust.
life for men and women choosing the path of religious life developed on the basis of the same pattern. First, at the source of all that is God's call and invitation to take a life based only on the Lord. Then it takes time "hearing sciences" and the decision to refer to God, that - like people after baptism, Gospel of John - to abandon what is evil and turn to good. And then there is still a desert, that is experience own weakness and the power of God that made me weak and sinful enables them to conquer the evil in ourselves and others. Religious People are not better or more perfect than others, there are no heroes. This - as we all - weak and sinful people, whom God called to their particular service and who, through His grace, they managed to do so much love and courage to this call to respond generously. Each monk and a nun have to go the same way as Jesus.
But first you need to leave the family home. Very often I No departure from home is becoming an obstacle in response to Jesus' call. Giving to scare the vision loss of family and parents - the loss of a daughter or son. And yet there is no maturity and adulthood - in any kind of life - without leaving home, without losing the children's sense of security and departure into the unknown future. To start a new, adult life, you have to say goodbye to so far. Calmly and with gratitude, but also vigorously and to the end to close the door behind her family home to go its own I marked out by God, by. The grace of the religious life may remain Refused, may remain incomplete if we can not afford to be completely entrusted to the Lord. But as Christians we do not live for themselves but for him, do not educate our children for themselves but for others and for Him. If you do not fall out of their sockets - not becomes independent, will not they knew how to love and accept love, have missed your vocation in life each.
second The desire for perfection - want to be close to Jesus
authentic religious life is not easy. On the contrary, a steep, bumpy, and sometimes reckless path of life, on which it is impossible to maintain without an awareness that I walk it not for his own whim, but because he called me to her Lord Jesus. It is he who first passed it, blazed the trail, he invited me to follow him. Awareness walk in his footsteps rewards the inconvenience of travel and the desire to reach the same peaks, which he reached, triggers - despite the fatigue - are still new energy and strength. Wanting to be there, where he is a desire of excellence. This perfection is not the sterile integrity, because none of us is without sin. Christian perfection consists in the greatest intimacy with Jesus, to accompany him to rest and fatigue, in joy and sorrow. This is the essence of Christian life and the essence of religious life. In Christianity, the monastic life and even more, is not about theories or the acquisition of spiritual qualifications. It's about Jesus. He is a goal to which we aspire, and also a road leading to this goal. To reach him, you leave behind comfortable and wide streets of our achievements and habits, smooth sidewalks of our plans and intentions, you have the baggage of life experience to go into the unknown. Without security and insurance, and guarantees no safety net, but with the light of the Holy Spirit and joyful trust in the heart, although I do not know what awaits me, I go with him and with him, that in this company for sure I get to the end. The unique beauty of religious life lies in being able to accompany the Lord Jesus in the implementation of his vocation and his mission. Awareness of this rewards all the hardships and inconveniences associated with this way of life.
desire perfection, that intimacy with the Lord Jesus is not something that can kindle the same. It's grace that He gives to free those whom he wants. But we can ask of Christ, that he was giving her the most generous, that more and more young hearts inflamed desire to follow Him. We can and should ask for the increasing number of new female and male hearts desire aroused radicalism of the Gospel, which is risky and crazy life - and because he himself was suspected of insanity - but a life full of unforgettable adventure, where taste can experience the only His faithful followers.
Above all, you need to pray fervently for it, we look at our Master and Lord, establishing intimacy with others for themselves able to look deep into your heart and with tremulous emotion to ask: are you and me, Lord? Maybe you calling me? We must fervently pray that we - in our hearts when we hear an affirmative answer - they could muster enough courage and love that despite the obvious sense of unworthiness and fear engulfing us, be able to answer how the young Samuel: Here I am Lord, after all You called me. We must also pray to us - when you hear this call of God in the heart of someone in our family - willing and able to protect it prior to extinguishing and jamming, and we ourselves do not stifle it by our resistance, anxiety and lack of acceptance.
third You call us as Peter
Through the Word of God, by touching the soul, through more or less explicit intuitions and various coincidences and cases of the Lord Jesus does not cease to cry in the hearts of many people, "Follow me" (Lk 5, 27). When - like Peter - in the sense of his own sinfulness, we say to him: "Depart from me Lord, I am a sinful man, the Lord Jesus calmly replies: Do not be afraid!
After our response could be a fascinating way to start the religious life of many and many a one of us. And although Jesus did not encourage us to choose the flashy ads or promises of easy, but hard words: "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me" (Mk 8:34), then if this way get to the end, we will be able to repeat for Peter, one of the most beautiful word in Sacred Scripture: "Lord, you know everything, you know that I love you (Jn 21:17).
Today's Feast of the Presentation of the Lord is a good opportunity to recall that in the Church there are also other forms of life devoted to God. Living in a world of consecrated virgins and widows made a commitment to purity, so as to grow in love for Christ and better serve our neighbor. Dedicate themselves to penance, works of charity, apostolate, and fervent prayer. Next to them are also leading the faithful hermits who publicly commit themselves to the evangelical counsels. Their separation from the world testifies to its temporality, and is an invitation to the ecclesial community not to lose sight of his most important appointment.
Finally
want to thank all who surround kindness and concern for priestly and religious vocations, and today they want to support the special victim cloistered convents. Let this exchange of gifts is an expression of our respect for persons continuously serving God in fasting and prayer, like Simeon and Anna in today's Gospel.
all those who have the courage to follow Jesus and continue on his journey, from the heart of bless.
Pastors of the Catholic Church in Poland gathered at the 353rd Plenary Polish Bishops' Conference in Warsaw, on 28-29 September 2010
letter to be read on the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, 2 February 2011
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