Dear Brothers and Sisters,
I was reading about the Fatima recently and I was reminded how the three children were prepared for their visit of Our Lady by a few visits of the Guardian Angel of Portugal. He spoke with them on these three visits and invited them to pray with him by repeating these words:
My God, I believe in Thee! I adore Thee! I hope in Thee, and I love Thee! I ask pardon of Thee for those who do not believe, do not adore, do not hope, and do not love Thee.
Three times the Angel said this prayer and invited the children to pray in the same way and the Hearts of Jesus and Mary will hear their petitions. The kids were so excited and were determined to make sacrifices as the Angel had told them to do. The third time he came he had a golden chalice in one hand and a Host in the other and they were suspended in mid-air while he laid on the ground and said another prayer, a very beautiful one, to the Holy Trinity. Afterwards, he gave all three of the children Holy Communion even though the two younger ones had never received before. They never told anyone about these visits until the following year, when Mary appeared to them on May 13, 1917, in a flash of lighting and she was standing on top of a small tree.
This time only Lucia, the oldest of the three, could hear what Our Lady said to them. She said she came from Heaven and wanted the kids to return on the thirteenth of each month for six months and afterwards she will tell them what she wanted. Mary had asked them if they were willing to offer themselves and bear all the suffering he would send to them for the conversion of sinners and of Russia. Lucia answered, “Oh, yes. We will.” After much begging from Jacinta and Francisco, Lucia finally told them of Mary’s request. Mary also asked that they say the rosary very devoutly and suffer for sinners. Little did they know what was in store for them.
Malcolm Muggeridge was making a movie on Mother Teresa of Calcutta’s Home for the Dying. He filmed some of it outside where there was plenty of light and then also within the house which had almost no light. They were very preoccupied that the video inside would not be able to be seen. In fact, this part of the video was brighter than the video taken outside. Muggeridge thought somehow the camera picked up the great love and charity that was in that room of those who were dying and were being cared for so well by Mother and her Sisters.
Why does Jesus say I am giving you a ‘New Commandment’ didn’t his Father always say to love one another, so what is new about what we hear today? It is ‘new’ because Jesus said to love one another as I have loved you. How can we possibly do that? He loved us and gave his life for us, and how could we possibly love in that way? Why would he ask us to do something that is so beyond us? There can be only one answer. He will do it for us! If we have him inside of us like when we receive him in Holy Communion, then we can love in this way. We need to keep coming like the three children of Fatima did with Mary and the two youngest ones even gave their life within the year after Our Lady spoke to them.
In the second reading St. John said, I saw a New Jerusalem, a holy city, coming down from heaven and adorned as a bride for her husband. Wow, what is this? It is the Church, the community, who little by little have learned to love in this way. It is a new community that is living this New Commandment, not on their strength but only with the help of Jesus Christ. This is the secret to be happy and at peace: to love as Jesus loved us, which will entail a lot of suffering. To love is to suffer. If there is no suffering, there is no love. When I love like this, I lose something of myself; something in me has to die in order to give life to the other, otherwise I am just looking for myself.
Let us ask for this kind of love which only comes from God, and he wants to give it to all of us.