Friday, November 24 : Saint Catherine of Siena

God revealed his secrets to me more particularly, and made me know admirable things. (…) God explained above all the mystery of the persecution that the Holy Church now suffers, and its renewal, its exaltation in time to come. To make me understand that the circumstances where the church is now found to be allowed to give it back its splendor, the supreme truth cited two words which are in the holy gospel: “It is necessary that the scandal arrives in the world. Then our Lord added: “But woe to the one by whom the scandal comes. (Mt 18.7) As if he said: I allow this time to persecution to tear off the thorns from which my spouse is surrounded, but I do not allow the guilty thoughts of men. Do you know what I’m doing? I do as I did when I was in the world; I made a rope whip, and I hunted those who traded in the temple, not wanting to make my father’s home become a cave of thieves. I tell you that I do the same now. I make a whip of creatures, and with this whip I chase the unclean, lustful, merchants swollen with prid , who profit from the gifts of the Holy Spirit. And indeed, with the whip of the persecution of creatures, our Lord hunted, and tore them away by the force of the tribulation from their shameful and deregulated life. (…) From the evil that bad Christians do persecuting the wife of Christ, must come honor, light, and the perfume of the virtues for His spouse. And it was so sweet, that it seemed to me that there was no comparison between the offense and the infinite goodness that God testified to his wife. So I was delighted, my heart leapt for joy, and I saw this time to come so clearly, that it seemed to me to possess it, taste it. (…) There were so great mysteries that language is unable to say them, the heart, to understand them, and the eye of seeing them.

Roman Catholic Ordinary Calendar – rosary,team