Transcription
One thing I've noticed from reading the comments is that a lot of non-Catholics are watching these videos, and I just want to say thank you so much for being here.
Interestingly enough, one of the questions I see coming up pretty often is about victim souls. So, let me share this clip with you from Father Iani on victim souls. I especially hope it helps all the non-Catholics watching learn a little more about the Catholic faith here. Listen to this.
"A victim soul is a generic expression that is used in different ways. A victim's soul, we have to first and foremost understand, is someone who embraces, for the salvation, conversion, salvation of souls, the sufferings of Christ in union with him and after the example of his own passion. So they offer up their thoughts, their words, their actions for this and the particular conversion or salvation, right? And, um, the word diff, the expression victim soul can be used in different ways in different degrees according to each person's state in life. Few victim souls, however, are chosen to receive extraordinary gifts like Luisa, like Padre Pio, like Falstein, and so forth. These are extraordinary victim souls, meaning they're victim souls handpicked by God to receive extraordinary gifts that the, the majority of us do not experience. Nor are we to expected, because that's not a vocation. But on a smaller scale, we can consider ourselves victim souls, inasmuch as we, like these especially endowed individuals, are embracing whatever sufferings come our way in union with our Savior and after the example of his passion. St. Paul says we are co-redeemers with Christ. That's a share in the victimhood of Christ. And, um, how do we become a victim soul of God? Well, Jesus tells Luisa that, um, he relies upon victim souls. Now, he's talking to all people here. He's not talking just to her. He says he relies upon victim souls in order to spare the world of chastisements and wars. Now, Luisa's love for souls was so intense that she often expressed and desired expressed a love to sacrifice her own life for their salvation and offered herself as a victim so many times, and he allowed her to vicariously participate in his internal sorrows, and she did so to either eliminate wars or mitigate their effects that would have otherwise impacted countries and cities. Take for example, volume, uh, 6, September 4th, 1905, where Jesus tells Luisa, 'This is the order of my providence, of my justice and of my love. With each epoch, I must have at least one soul with whom to share all the blessings I possess. And that soul must give me everything it owes me in its capacity according to its state and its propensity. Otherwise, why maintain the world? In one moment, I would demolish it. This is precisely why I choose victim souls. Just as a divine justice, just as divine justice found in my will, all-embracing humanity, everything it should find in all souls, and together shared with me all the blessings it should have shared with all souls. So why find everything in these victim souls? And I share with them all the blessings that I possess.' Let me repeat that. Just as divine justice found in my will, all-embracing humanity, everything it should find in all souls, and together shared with me all the blessings it should have shared with all souls. So I find everything in these victim's souls and I share with them all the blessings that I possess. He also tells her in volume 12, September 26, 1919, 'My daughter, one who is a victim's soul must be exposed to receiving all the blows of the divine justice, and must feel within herself the pains of souls and the rigors which these pains deserve from the divine justice.' Again, always in the capacity of each individual. Oh, how my humanity moaned under the rigors of these. Indeed, from your s state of privation and abandonment, you can see how souls treat me and how the divine justice is about to punish them with the most terrible scourges. Man has reached the state of complete madness, and with mad men, the hardest lashes must be used. God does not wish us to see all the fruits of our labors. Now, that's not what this theater of redemption, this exile in which we live is for. This is a journey of faith. If God showed us all the results, there would be no need for faith. So God wants us not to see until the end what our deeds yield, the good and bad our deeds produce. And, uh, he did the same thing with the saints."
And now try and relate the first clip to the next one that follows. So when the devil attempts you or tries to distract you or sow fear into your heart, even through these gloom and doom preachers that from time and again are proven false by the Church, just tell the devil when he enters your mind with these distracting, despairing thoughts, "These ill thoughts placed in my mind, to Thee, O Jesus, I quickly bind that Thou might cast them far from me. By Thine own fiat, set me free." So courage is a very powerful tool against fear.
Now, in these end times, we're being, we're being given by the media, the secular media, they call it a psychological operation, a psyop. They throw out all these fearful tactics at you, whether it's on account of a virus, whether it's on account of drones, whether it's on account of this or that. Whether it's true or not is not what I'm addressing here. I'm simply addressing the response that they instill in you. Whether they do it deliberately or not does not matter. What matters is this fear has no place in you as a Christian. And courage is the answer that gives you peace. But courage does not come by itself. It's the fruit of number one, what Jesus told Luisa, what Mary told you, Menendez. Humbling yourself in prayer, considering yourself unworthy to merit such trials, resigning yourself to the divine will. And in that moment, peace comes. And you offer up those trials as a pleasing sacrifice, a holocaust, an oblation to God of praise, satisfaction, reparation for the offenses he receives. And the devil, seeing you courageous, which is the last quality that follows, humble prayer, resignation, offering up, courage. Once he sees that courage, he flees.
Now, here's another one. And this time, I think you'll find this explanation much easier to understand and remember about what happens at baptism.
"Now, we often use the expression grace to express God's power in our lives. Now, there's really only one grace of God, although we often use the word graces, right? But there's really only one grace with several manifestations. God's one grace assumes various applications which constitute the singular graces, right? Here we go again with the word graces that prelaps Aarian and Adam enjoy. Now, there is one grace of God, but it assumes various applications. So the scholastics broke down grace into various manifestations or applications. Consider, for example, the grace we receive at baptism. That's known as sacramental grace because it comes through the sacrament of baptism. But within that sacrament, there's also justifying grace, which takes away original sin, and sanctifying grace, which makes us a creature of God, the one with the mystical body of Christ through the not only exfusion of original sin but the infusion of faith, hope, and love. The three divine persons come to us in this way in the moment of baptism. So when the priest or the minister pours water above the head of the individual, right, in that moment, sin does not simply leave of its own accord. Sin doesn't want to leave. Original sin wants to stay. What makes it leave? The influx of God. Sin cannot share space with God if God comes in his fullness. And that's what happens at baptism. Hence, a plenary indulgence. So when a person is baptized, God's fullness floods the soul, taking away all sin and punishment due to sin through the admission of a greater power, which is a divine power. And this divine power is also referred to as the theological gifts, namely faith, hope, and love. They are theological gifts in the moment of their admission in the soul. But as the child progresses to reason and exercises the virtues, they are now referred to as theological virtues. They're one in the same gifts, virtues, but they're virtues in the sense that they can be exercised, and we can grow in faith and hope and love in the measure we exercise these theological virtues, which are, they're gifts inasmuch as they are freely given at the moment of baptism. But they are virtues inasmuch as they are subject to exercise. All right."
And on to the next one. This time, a reminder for everyone listening about giving our will to God.
"God looks for our firm decision, our fiat, our unconditional yes to do his will in all things. Remember, God does not do anything that will not benefit us in this life and in the next. Sometimes we may have a distorted perception of God's will as if he wants to make us victims, sacrificial lambs that will be suffering day and night. We cut off from all our friends, all our pleasures, and we will have to basically be a doormat to God. That's not the way God is. God respects our liberty, our freedom. He never forces the human will. And when we give our will to God, he is very delicate in giving us crosses. He never gives us a cross too heavy to carry. Paul makes this clear. Augustine makes this clear. And the more generous we are with God, the more generous he is with us. The more we trust God, the more he trusts us. He treats us more as an adult. The more spiritually mature we become. When we give our yes to God, a fusion occurs, a fusion with God's will, not confusion, just fusion, whereby God immediately begins to purify the soul of its stains, to break the inordinate attachments of its human nature, and to pulverize its sins and vices, all of which present obstacles to union with his will. And this is a very good thing."
And so, here's the final clip I wanted to share with you. I really hope, especially for any non-Catholics watching, that you've learned quite a bit about the Catholic faith.
"Remember, we are not in eternity on earth. Our bodies are not. They must suffer corruption, peckability, the laws of peability, the laws of passibility, the laws of death and so forth. The soul is not susceptible to such things. And therefore, we come face to face with time and eternity. While we are doing our morning offering in a general way on earth, the body is in time, while the soul is in eternity. And therefore, the soul takes within its sweep all creatures of the past, present, future, and presents them to God in the present, the eternal now. But the body participates in performing in the present. The body cannot go into the past or the future, only the soul can. Those eternal acts. Remember, in the general judgment, or you may say on the day of the general judgment, if such a word exists, there is no day in God's eyes like days like a thousand years, a thousand years like a day. Peter says on the symbolic day of judgment, general judgment, God will raise up not just our immortal souls to a public pronouncement of righteousness or condemnation, but the bodies too. And therefore, when we are doing our divine acts on earth in the eternal mode, God, who is eternal and who is empowering these divine acts within us from his one eternal will, is the one agent performing those acts, while we are the co-operators or co-agents in that operation or agency of Christ or the Father or the Spirit, if not all three, through the intellect, memory, and will, the heart, the breath, and the blood, empowering the soul and the body at once. And therefore, the body and the soul are inseparable but distinct, like the three persons of the Trinity. Yes, at the moment of doubt, the body is separated momentarily from the soul, but the faculties of the body, namely the senses that come from the soul, continue in the soul in heaven, purgatory, and hell without the body. So there is this inseparability of sensorial experience and perception in the soul, even when it's momentarily separated from the body, which is in the grave. In that sense, they are always inseparable. In fact, if you read the writings of the saints and the writings of the New Testament, you will find that in hell, the soul experiences pain just as it had a body, even though it's without a body physically until the general judgment. Then it will be rejoined to the body. And then at that moment, the glories that the soul experiences in heaven without the body will redouble, and those pains it experiences in hell will do likewise at the moment of eternal judgment."
Well then, that will be all for the video this time. And as always, thank you so much for taking the time to be here with us. And hopefully, all of you have learned so much from this video. And remember, ever you have any feedback or suggestion, please let us know in the comments below. And from the bottom of my heart, thank you so much for your continuous support, contributions, and prayers. And until the next one, thanks again for watching, and may God bless you.