PASSING TO THE OTHER SIDE: WHY IT WILL FEEL LIKE 'HOME'

There are many mansions. There are hovels and huts and basements and small homes. There are lonely apartments. There are grand edifices. We move into our state of mind. 

 

Everyone reading this has a chance to turn their state of mind into Heaven.

The very last decision a non-believer can make in a state of earthly free-will is whether he finally accepts the Lord now that he faces eternity.

There is that one last chance – which is why prayers must be said for the dying no matter how hostile they have been to religion.

The Blessed Mother has said to “pray daily for the souls in purgatory. For every soul, prayer and grace are necessary to reach God and the love of God. By doing this, dear children, you obtain new intercessors who will help you in life to realize that all the earthly things are not important for you, that only Heaven is that for which it is necessary to strive. Therefore, dear children, pray without ceasing that you may be able to help yourselves and the others to whom your prayers will bring joy.” 

Sometimes the call for prayer comes in dreams, when the veil is thin.

“I want to share a very powerful story with you that occurred a little over a year ago,” a woman from Shakopee, Minnesota, named Angela Howick wrote me. “It begins with a dream I had. 

 

“This dream was very different and I woke up with an intense desire to pray. I dreamed that I walked into a large room and it was filled with many deceased family members and friends. Although I could not see faces or physical bodies, I knew every single one of them. It was as if I knew their souls. 

 

“I left the room and went down a small hallway. There in the hallway was my recently deceased uncle sitting on a bench. He was staring towards the sky and did not even look at me. I was very excited to see him and immediately said ‘Freddy!  What are you doing?’ He responded in a very calm yet discontent voice, saying, ‘I am waiting.’ This was not the response I was expecting. My uncle was a very happy go-lucky, loud man who was always excited to see anyone. I asked him again, ‘Freddy, what are you doing?’ 

“He looked down at me and we locked eyes. His response was the same: ‘I am waiting.’ He then continued to stare towards the sky.  

 

“At that moment I knew what he was waiting for. He was waiting to be released from purgatory. In that moment I woke up and knew he needed prayers.  

“A couple of weeks later, I called my aunt to discuss having a Gregorian Mass said for him. I was surprised to find out that she was actually having many Gregorian Masses said for several deceased relatives and friends. She had even already called in the Masses, including one for my uncle. My aunt gave me the list of names and dates for when their Masses would start, so that I could unite my prayers and intentions with them.  I wrote down all the names and dates.

“Later that night, I was praying and I realized that all of the names she had mentioned to me were the souls I saw in my dream. One particular name stood out for me. This was her father-in-law (let’s call him Bert), a man who died before I was born. Even though, I had never seen a picture of him or thought about him before, I know that he was in that room in my dream, along with all of the other people on the list for Masses. 

“A few weeks later, I was praying the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, while driving to Mass and when I got to the very last ‘Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us and on the whole world,’ I was overcome by an enormous sense of peace and joy. 

 

All of a sudden I started to cry because of this joy. I was not just shedding a few tears. I was wailing. I called out to the Lord, ‘Why do I feel this way?’  Then I heard three names: ‘Freddy, Hermie, and Bert were released from purgatory.’ I looked at the clock, 10:30 a.m. I knew that someone’s Gregorian Masses were ending that day, but I couldn’t remember whose.  When I returned home, I looked at the list of names and dates and discovered that was the day the Masses for those three people had finished.”

Alone in the dark – if only briefly – those who have strayed from the Lord are there to contemplate themselves.

In that contemplation is the truth of the situation and the need for prayers.

There are no more masks.

No longer can one hide behind a smile or hypocrisy or materialism.

We go where we think. 

 

We step into the love we created.

With that love, said the Blessed Mother, we will not even feel the transition. 

 

“If you would abandon yourselves to me, you will not even feel the passage from this life to the next life,” was her incredible promise to a locutionist. “You will begin to live the life of Heaven from this earth.”

Source: Spiritdaily

Work To Sanctify Your Soul

Fr. Ed Broom, OMV

 

Work is good for us! Why? Jesus taught us the importance of work by spending most of His time on earth in Nazareth with Mary His Mother and Saint Joseph, His foster-father. Among the many activities that Jesus carried out was that of WORK.   True! Saint Joseph taught Jesus the hard and demanding work of a carpenter. No electric helps back then!  Nailing, and sawing and sanding and adjusting wood to construct tables, doors, chairs, etc. This indeed was hard-work.

In my private meditations I have often imagined Jesus and Saint Joseph arriving home after a hard-day’s work. Imagine them. Exhausted, drenched with sweat, their hair filled with saw-dust, their hands grimy and calloused. This was not on occasions, but day after day.

This being the case, in a world where the importance of the work-ethic has largely gone by the wayside, where many choose the easy-path of not working or cutting corners, where laziness and indolence is all the more prevalent, we would like to present positive reasons why we should truly value work in its many dimensions, shapes and forms and embrace the work ethic all the days of our short lives on earth. St. Paul says, “Work out your salvation in fear and trembling.”  Saint Albert Hurtado stated: “There are two places to rest while on earth: the cemetery and heaven.”  Let us work hard in this short stay on earth and then we can rest forever in heaven with Jesus, Mary and good Saint Joseph.

Following are some reasons to motivate us to embrace a more serious work ethic so as to perfect our lives on a human level, but even more on a spiritual level. Here are five specific points to motivate us.

Imitation of Jesus and Mary.   At Nazareth, where Jesus spent most of His life on earth, He lived the family life, which consisted of loving and obeying His parents, prayer to His heavenly Father, but also Jesus worked and He worked hard—that of a carpenter. Therefore, one very clear reason for work is to imitate Jesus, Mary and St. Joseph; they are our models in everything and that includes dedication to work.  The three of them worked hard, orderly and methodically and for the honor and glory of God. Such should be our work ethic!

Charity Towards Others. Another reason and positive effect of work well-done is that it can be turned into a service of love towards others. An industrious mother and wife that spends long hours in the kitchen both cooking, preparing and cleaning can indeed be very hard work, but it can also be an act of service towards others as well as an act of charity. Saint Paul reminds us to purify our motives: “Whether you eat or drink do all for the honor and glory of God.”

Avoid the Many Temptations of Sin.  Saint John Bosco, the well-known patron of the young, experienced a mortal fear every year at the same time.  Vacation time for the young! Why? For the simple reason that many of his young would leave the Oratory, where the young worked hard all year at study, sports and other activities, and now they would return to a home where they had too much free time.  The proverb rings so true: “Idleness is the workshop of the devil.”  If the young person does not have anything to do then the devil will give him a lot to do in great abundance. Hard work and diligence in work is a key means to conquer the devil and his allies.

Eternity and Eternal Recompense. The Word of God teaches us constantly that we will get our reward or punishment on the quality of our lives and how we utilize out time, treasures and talents. Look at the lives and the example of the saints and how hard they prayed, but also how hard they worked. The motto of Saint Benedict was Ora et Labora, which is translate as “pray and work.” The great Doctor of the Church and patron of moral theologians and great lover of Mary, St. Alphonsus, made a private vow which consisted of simply this: not wasting a moment of his life. Honestly, all of the saints strive to live the spirit of this private vow of Saint Alphonsus. Life is short and time indeed is of the essence.  A modern Chilean and Jesuit Saint, who died in his early fifties of pancreatic cancer, Saint Alberto Hurtado expressed it succinctly: “There are two places to rest: the cemetery and heaven.”

A Good Example to Others.  We all know how true it is that we often follow the example of others, be it for good or be it for evil. The Hispanics have a proverb: “El ejemplo arrastra”—translated: “Example drags or pulls!” As a child I actually hated Saturday mornings for the simple reason that my father made me, my older brother and then eventually the younger ones work and work hard. I indeed hated Saturdays. However, I do have to admit that the boys worked hard but saw the harder work and example of Dad. In all honesty, he worked harder and better than his sons.  In other words, he preached the ethic of work, not so much by many words, but by the power of example, his own hard work-ethic.

Source: Catholic Exchange