Blog Archives - CRUSADERS FOR CHRIST

Remember Me - Holy Saturday

4/11/2020

The Gospel in its directions towards holiness opens out to us the path of humility, bidding us walk in it. ‘I say to you that unless you become as little children you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.’' Have not little children a mother? A mother who receives their earliest confidences, who follows their earliest intelligences, who accepts their first crosses and who is their advocate when they are in disgrace? This is what Mary is to the Christian; for every Christian, whether king or slave, rich or poor, old or young, has stepped down from the throne of his knowledge, the pinnacle of his wealth, the strength of his manhood, to become a child. Devotion to Mary, which would seem to promise only to soften our sentiments and feelings, also raises them, and in that perhaps includes all Christian teaching. The virtues that belong exclusively to Mary, the silence and gentleness, in no way exclude strength and energy. See if there was ever sorrow like to her sorrow. Her Son spares her nothing at the foot of the cross neither His agony nor his death, the tears that accompany it, nor the sight of His mangled and lifeless body. Her strength bears an exact proportion to her weakness. Jesus bore the weight of the sins of men, Mary the weight of their sorrows.
- Mme. Swetchine

The more entirely you give yourself to the Blessed Virgin, the more she will give herself to you. Your confidence will be the measure of her bounty.
- Pere Cestac

Remember Me - Good Friday

4/10/2020

Sacrifice is one of life’s great laws, both in the material and in the moral order ; it is indeed a universal law. What can be achieved without sacrifice? The value of a thing is in proportion to the labor it has cost. The greater the object sought, the grander the renunciation in its attainment. Every state of life, every position, has its sacrifices, a truth commonly referred to as ‘'the reverse of the medal.” And it is remarkable that we only really esteem and admire what represents difficulties overcome, and seek out such results only, to serve as the setting of our treasures. The works and the monuments that nations count as their greatest ornaments, have cost the architect, the student, the composer, untold labor. What application they represent, what efforts of thought and will, what sleepless nights, what depression and discouragement overcome! And these sacrifices were made for the passing shadow of glory. We work so willingly for temporal gains!

The sacrifice of ourselves given to God renders us holy to ourselves. A life of sacrifice is a life drawn from a divine fountain, from the Life of Sacrifice Christ lived on earth, whence was drawn the salvation of the world. The Son of God became man to suffer and to end His earthly life by the supreme Sacrifice of the Cross. All phases of sacrifice are united in His ''Consumniatum est!' The sacrifice is perfect.
- Comtesse de T

Jesus Christ had nowhere to lay His head on earth except the tomb.
- Pascal

Remember Me - Maundy Thursday

4/9/2020

Our Lord’s temptation in the desert is typical of our assault by worldly desires, but the Son of God deigned also to experience the subtle temptations that attack the higher intelligences. There are souls above the assault of carnal vices, souls that pass by, untouched, the vain fancies and ambitions of their generation, and whose merit in disdaining the world’s deceit and injustice is slight; and yet these include with their greatness much that is pitiful and small. Such combatants as Satan cannot overcome by pleasure or the pride of life, he thinks to subdue by fear, or even by ennui.

Lord, I am sick of this dreary life. I do not ask for excitement or delight, but to have ever in front an undiminishing load of duty—I cannot bear it. Is there no relief? Day and night the thought of sacrifice is with me; it haunts my sleep, my waking hours are like a frightful dream. My heart is weary of the unchanging prospect. Fain would I be Thine, be with Thee, but conform, I pray Thee, the requirements of Thy law to my weakness. Such is the temptation.

Jesus, loving Lord, teach me to be faithful to my God. Thou too hast been overcome. Thou hast sweated blood. Thy soul has been sorrowful, even to death. Thy grief has been like a flood—Ah Jesus, Thou dost not answer! Temptation
oppresses Thee and Thou prayest. Since then Thy lips do not reply to me, I too will pray.
- Pere Chassay

Remember Me - Wednesday in Holy Week

4/8/2020

Admire the silence with which Christ suffers His many injuries. Who would not have supposed that Divine Justice would have armed every spectator to revenge such terrible treatment? Or that, at least, Jesus would have defended His innocence with His own sublime eloquence? It is otherwise: “Jesus was silent.’’ Ah, me —the innocent Jesus is accused of so many crimes, before so many judges, in the sight of so many people; an ill-report is His, dangers surround Him, thorns, nails, the cross, await Him—and He is altogether silent. ‘‘Jesus was silent.” He would supply for your pride by His shame, and so He is silent. ‘‘But He held His tongue.”

Learn to hate your impatient volubility, when you have to suffer anything similar. ‘"Come hither my Jesus and teach me silence.” Compare your innocence with His, the accusations you incur with those of Jesus, the reasons for self defense you think you have with those of your Master. Set the sentence you have to fear side by side with that He incurred. “He was silent.” And you ? You can only blush for your querulous loquacity.
- Belledo

In times of agitation, be silent; when your spirit is calm speak.
- Pere Cestac

Remember Me - Tuesday in Holy Week

4/7/2020

We too often forget that maxim of the Saints which warns us to consider ourselves as each day recommencing our progress towards perfection. If we consider it frequently we shall not be surprised at the poverty of our spirit, nor how much we have to refuse ourselves. The work is never finished, we have continually to begin again and that courageously. What we have done so far is good, but what we are going to commence will be better, and when we have finished that, we shall begin something else that will be better still, and then another— until we leave this world to begin a new life that will have no end because it is the best that can happen to us.

It is not then a case for tears that we have so much work to do for our souls, for we need great courage to go ever onwards (since we must never stop), and much resolution to restrain our desires. Observe carefully this precept that all the Saints have given to those who would emulate them: to speak little, or not at all, of yourself and your own interests.
- St. Francis de Sales

You will only love God in proportion as you learn to suffer silently and to prefer Him to every created thing.
- Blessed Margaret Mary

Remember Me - Monday in Holy Week

4/6/2020

The bond of our union with God is the love of God above all things. ‘‘He that dwells in charity dwells in God and God in him” Here is the link of gold which joins the soul of God. Keep that link fast, and do not be afraid when the consciousness of your past sins and of your many temptations seem to come down upon you and overwhelm you as a flood. In those darkest times, be sure that if you love God you are still united with Him. It is not when we walk in the brightness of the noonday only, that we are united with Him. The purest union with God is when we walk with Him in the darkness, without consolation and without joy, having no other guide; our hand in His hand; going on like children, not knowing whither, but obeying the inspirations of God to do or not to do as He wills: out in the bleak cold sky, with no joy in our prayers and no rest of heart, in constant inward fears, with temptations all around but always faithful to the guidance of the Spirit of God. “Whosoever are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God”

There are two axioms in the kingdom of God which never fail; no penitent soul can perish, and no soul that loves God can be lost.
- Cardinal Manning

Never depart from Jesus on earth if thou wouldst live and rejoice with Jesus in heaven.
- Thomas d Kempis

Remember Me - The Sixth Sunday in Lent - Palm Sunday

4/5/2020

'‘The master hath need of them." Observe the poverty of our Blessed Savior. In His days of modest triumph He has nothing but what men choose to lend, or to give Him. And now in our days He is quite as poor as then. Here on earth man is rich. God is poor. "The Heaven of Heavens is the Lord’s, but the earth He has given to the children of men.”

It is as when a good father makes over a property to his eldest son. He has given it, and will not take it back. "The Lord has sworn and will not repent.” Therefore in this world man is master, and our Lord is poor and quite dependent. If He wants bread for His poor He comes for it. If He wants instruction for His little ones He comes to us. Even when He wants to offer the Everlasting Sacrifice, He cannot do it till we give Him the juice of the grape, and the wheaten bread, "and provide an altar, and the priest, and the vestments.” If He wants to soothe the soul of the dying. He cannot carry out His loving wish till we give Him as an alms the oil of peace and gladness.

O how humble of heart our Blessed Lord is when He stoops so low as to tell me that He has need of me! We often say, "I do not choose to be under obligation to this man.” Our Lord and our God wishes most ardently to be under obligation to each of us, that thus He may have a plea for pouring out all His riches on us throughout eternity.
- Fr. Gallwey S.J.

Remember Me - Friday after the Fifth Sunday in Lent

4/3/2020

Devotion and prayers to the Blessed Virgin are admirable and useful under every invocation and in whatever manner they are made, but I venture to assert that the most profitable form, as well as the one that redounds most to our credit, is that in which we appeal to her as Our Lady of Dolours. She stood immersed in sorrows at the foot of the cross, and our Lord Jesus Christ gave us all to her in the person of the beloved disciple, to replace her dying Son, and He destined His most holy Mother to become ours. Hence, whenever we betake ourselves to Mary under her title of sorrow, we go to our mother; and go as children, as designed by her divine Son. What can be more glorious for us than that the Queen of Heaven and Earth has, under her title of Mother of Sorrows, also become our mother? This is certainly a glory that the Angels would envy us, if they were capable of envy, since the Blessed Virgin is their Queen, but not their Mother. And what can be more profitable to us than that the dispenser of grace and divine benefits recognizes us in our sorrow as her children, recommended to her by the same Jesus before He died? How must those loving words ever echo in her heart? How dear to her must be their memory, and what special acceptance she must grant to our prayers when we approach her under this appellation. Happy are we, if, each time we invoke Our Lady of Dolours, we do it with a pure heart and a devout remembrance of so great a love; happier still, if, after we have enjoyed her love through life, she shall at its close show us the fruit of her womb, Jesus, acknowledging us, in His place, as the children of His most glorious Mother.
- Marchese di Tito

Remember Me - Thursday after the Fifth Sunday in Lent

4/2/2020

"Learn of Me, because I am meek and humble of heart,” St. Bernards remarks, ''What pride is there which the humility of the divine Master cannot extinguish? Verily, it may be said that He alone in reality humbles and abases Himself, and that we, when we seem to humiliate ourselves,' do not lower ourselves at all, but simply take the place which belongs to us. For, being all creatures, guilty perhaps of a thousand misdeeds, we can lay claim to no other right than nothingness and punishment. But our Savior Jesus Christ lowered Himself infinitely beneath that lofty height which belongs to Him.

He is the omnipotent God, the Infinite and Immortal, the supreme Arbiter of all things. And notwithstanding this, He became man, weak, mortal, subject to suffering, obedient even to death. He bore the lack of all temporal things. He, who in heaven, constituted the joy of the angels and of the saints, willed to become the Man of Sorrows and took upon Himself each and all of the miseries of humanity.

The uncreated Wisdom, and of all wisdom the Principle, has borne the shame and mockery due to a fool. The Holy of Holies, and Sanctity in essence, suffered Himself to be reputed a villain and a malefactor. He whom the countless hosts of the blessed in heaven adore, willed to die a disgraceful death upon a cross. And lastly, He who by nature is the Sovereign Good, endured every kind of human misery.

Then, after such an example of humility what ought we not to do—we who are dust and ashes? And what humiliation should ever appear hard to us, who are not only worms of earth but miserable sinners?
- Pope Leo XIII

Remember Me - Wednesday After the Fifth Sunday in Lent

4/1/2020

There is a danger of forming a false idea of holiness. To hear some people talk one would suppose it necessary to leave everything, to throw away all, to bury oneself in a desert and there devote oneself entirely to prayer and mortification. People then reply, that is impossible, so holiness must be left to the saints; and then betake themselves to a myriad of faults, sins, infidelities towards God. That is to say, under the excuse of not being able to become saints, they make themselves quite easy about their state, and slip on swiftly to their own condemnation.

This is an error, invented by the spirit of lies, accepted by the world, favored by the passions, which ask no better than to find a plausible pretext for satisfying the conscience. This is not sanctity. Sanctity consists in the accomplishment of the duties God lays upon us. In this way one who fulfills well the duties of his station, and, much more one who fulfills them well for God, will become a real saint—nothing more is needed.
- Pere Cestac

The secret of being always with God and of assuring His continual presence in our hearts is constant prayer.
- St. Isidore