The Way on Earth to Heaven
Introduction
One must do everything with faith, hope, and charity.
Without faith, one knows nothing of the supernatural, and without charity, nothing avails anything. Charity needs hope to be perfect; it must know that the Beloved invites us, or better, that we are invited to the Beloved for eternity. Charity desires union, otherwise it is frustrated.
It is in the greatest possible faith, hope, and charity that one takes the shortest and most powerful way:
1. The first thing to which one must devote oneself with all one’s might and strength is humility. Saint Benedict understood this well, and he became the father of Western monasticism. Without acts of humility, without accepted humiliations, one cannot grow in humility. Such humiliations are easy to provoke, and thus humility can be increased by meditating on our relationship to God. All our being and existence, all our qualities and properties are infinitely smaller than God, because God is infinite, being in Himself, while we are limited creatures. Moreover, many of our qualities are lesser than those of some of our fellow men, and some qualities are simply lacking in us, or are so slight that they are rather infirmities or vices. Since the difference with God is thus infinite, this meditation is also inexhaustible. That God possesses everything in infinite degree has even been proven by philosophy (Aristotle, Saint Thomas Aquinas). Thus, this meditation is not difficult.
Since we humble ourselves in this meditation, two salutary effects occur:
– with every act of a virtue (humility), that virtue increases (as a habitus), that is a psychological law;
– Our Lord Jesus says: “He who humbles himself shall be exalted”; through this exercise we humble ourselves, so we are exalted by Jesus (through graces, consolations, answered prayers, etc.).
A second method to grow in humility is, like Mary (writes de Montfort at the beginning of his Treatise on the True Devotion to Mary), to ask God Himself for humiliations, which we must then bear with His graces. This is more difficult and harder than the meditation that we ourselves control. Both methods are effective. Practice both, but ask for humiliations which God knows we will bear well.
Then ask for final perseverance and the highest possible holiness for which God has created you. That is a prayer very pleasing to God, and it is the most important thing you need: final perseverance and your destination of holiness.
Indeed, just read it in the holy authors: he who has final perseverance has everything (God in heaven), he who does not have it has nothing in eternity, even if he had everything else on earth.
2. The second is that one, in this humility, fully devotes oneself to the interior devotion to Our Lady as de Montfort says in the aforementioned work and also in “The Secret of Mary”. The Marian way is the shortest, the easiest, and the most perfect way to Jesus and God. Moreover, Mary was the champion of humility; she sings it in the Magnificat: “He has regarded the lowliness of His handmaid”.
3. In this Marian devotion and way, one must concentrate on loving God with all one’s strength. For the love of God is the most important thing we have to do. Our Lord Jesus says it: loving God with all our strength and our neighbour as ourselves is the summary of the whole religion.
4. In short: live in continual humility, as a slave of love of Mary, with, in, through, and for Her, contemplate God’s four great works of love – Creation, Providence, Redemption, and Sanctification – and see how lovable He is so that you may continually love Him day and night, and grow therein.
5. If our love is not great enough to suffice and evil still attracts us, we should best meditate daily and as much as possible on the four last things. Holy Scripture says: he who thinks of his last things will not sin. Those last things are: death, judgment, heaven or hell. Much has been written about it; read about it if you lack inspiration.
6. Since for us here and now the Redemption is His greatest work for us, let us occupy ourselves especially with that. Let us be as perfect members as possible of the Holy Church, devoted to her Teaching, Morality, Sacraments, sacramentals, devotions, and prayers. Especially practice the devotion to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion, for those are the most powerful devotions. Saint John Bosco and Father Poppe recommended the three white devotions as the most powerful to obtain graces: the White Host, the White Lady (Mary), and the White Lord (the Pope, namely studying the infallible Teaching of the Church, the catechisms, etc.).
7. Since we are in a violent crisis of the Church, it is of vital importance that we belong to the true Church, to the group that is really the Church, that has valid sacraments, and is neither heretical, semi-heretical, nor schismatic, and that promotes the common good of the Church. Then obedience is of essential importance, for through disobedience in pride came the original sin, and Our Lord Jesus was obedient unto death on the cross.
8. Since love is the most important thing (1 Cor 13), one must above all devote oneself to it and in that love beg from Mary the final perseverance. She desires and is able to grant it; that is why the Holy Church has us pray in the “Hail Mary”: “now and at the hour of our death. Amen.”
If you wish to show gratitude to me for this article, you could do no better than to pray for me, a poor sinner. Thank you in advance.