Praying With The Heart

There is a book called, Pray With The Heart!: Medugorje Manual of Prayer, by Fr. Slavko Barbaric, O.F.M.
It reflects on messages of the Virgin Mary in Medugorje, including:

"Dear children! You know that the time of joy is approaching, and without love you will achieve nothing. Therefore, first start loving your family, all your parishioners, and then you will be able to love and accept all those who come here! Let this week be a time for you to learn how to love. Thank you for having responded to my call!" (December 13, 1984)

"Dear children! Today I want to tell you to pray before starting to work and to finish your work with prayer. If you do so, God will bless you and your work. These days you have been praying little and working much. So pray! You will find rest in prayer. Thank you for having responded to my call!" (July 5, 1984)

"Dear children! I invite each of you to start living in God's love. Dear children, you are ready to commit sin, and to give yourselves up into the hands of Satan thoughtlessly. I invite each of you to decide for God consciously, and against Satan. I am your mother. Therefore, I want to lead you all to complete holiness. I want each of you to be with me in heaven. This is, dear children, the purpose of my coming here, and my wish. Thank you for having responded to my call." (May 25, 1987)

"Dear children! I would like to tell you today to start working on your hearts like you work in your fields. Work and change your hearts that a new spirit from God may settle down in them. Thank you for having responded to my call." (April 25, 1985)

"Dear children! I invite you to help Jesus with your prayers realize all the plans which he is making here. Present your sacrifices to Jesus as well, so that everything may be realized as he has planned it, thus thwarting all plans of Satan. Thank you for having responded to my call!" (January 9, 1986)

Any thoughts?

When was this book written?

Originally Posted by Brian

When was this book written?

Prior to 1989, but I'm not sure when it was actually written.

Originally Posted by Psychotheosophy

"... thus thwarting all plans of Satan."

Which plans do you think have not yet been thwarted?

"Our Lady is aware that all her qualities results only from her personal relationship with Jesus Christ. And everything she has advised us has only one aim: to bring us to Jesus... And he will bring you closer to peace, to love, to reconciliation and togetherness of all people as brothers and sisters,... And exactly such as (a family) gathers in Medugorje from all the four winds: Christ is its head, the Holy Spirit its strength, Mary its mother, and heaven its home." (from the Preface)

How do you understand Christ?
(It's important to separate good from evil.)

[theophilus]

Originally Posted by Psychotheosophy

There is a book called, Pray With The Heart!: Medugorje Manual of Prayer, by Fr. Slavko Barbaric, O.F.M.
It reflects on messages of the Virgin Mary in Medugorje, including:

There is really nothing new in these messages that you couldn't learn from reading the Bible.

Before you accept these messages as really coming from the Virgin Mary you should read this:

http://eternal-productions.org/PDFS/Queen%20of%20All%20Article.pdf

Originally Posted by Psychotheosophy

How do you understand Christ?

In Catholicism,

Jesus took on evil in his humanity (sin, suffering, death),
And removed it by his divinity,
Like the scapegoat related to Yom Kippur,
(see Leviticus 16; 23: 26-32; 25: 9; Numbers 29: 7-11).
By uniting to his humanity, we also have evil removed by his divinity (e.g. receiving the Eucharist at Mass).

"Do not look for visionaries, do not bother about shopping. Try to live humbly! Mary educates for a new simplicity. But without Bethlehem, without the Cross, without meeting on the Hill of Mission and without Jerusalem, as places of prayer, we cannot understand what is essential here, nor can we be sent out."

Pray With The Heart!: Medugorje Manual of Prayer

Good things (including ourselves) are not goodness itself (God),
But we place good things at the service of goodness.

"Liberty: Israelite slaves were set free (verse 50), and landed property was returned to its original owner (verse 13): two important laws for preserving the social and economic equilibrium."

The New American Bible commentary for chapter 25 of Leviticus related to the scapegoat and day of atonement (Yom Kippur)

Equality is a good thing.

Originally Posted by Psychotheosophy

Good things are not goodness itself (God),
But we place good things at the service of goodness.

In Catholicism,
Equality is a good thing,
But we place it at the service of goodness (God, love).
If we don't place it at the service of goodness,
Then goodness = evil.

Originally Posted by Psychotheosophy

"Dear children! You know that the time of joy is approaching, and without love you will achieve nothing. ...

"...I want to lead you all to complete holiness. ..."

In Catholicism,
Evil is a lack of goodness,
Goodness that is a lack of goodness (goodness = evil),
Is a lack of goodness (evil).

Since existence is good,
Then a lack of existence is evil.
(Evil is not a something, but a lack of a something (goodness).)

""Dear children! I invite you to help Jesus with your prayers realize all the plans which he is making here. Present your sacrifices to Jesus as well, so that everything may be realized as he has planned it, thus thwarting all plans of Satan. Thank you for having responded to my call!" (January 9, 1986)"

We pursue goals because we believe that they are good (not evil).
Satan pursues goals that are evil (goodness = evil).

"Dear children! I invite each of you to start living in God's love. Dear children, you are ready to commit sin, and to give yourselves up into the hands of Satan thoughtlessly. I invite each of you to decide for God consciously, and against Satan. ...

Since goodness is not evil, we reject contradictions in our thinking (such as goodness = evil).
But the repression of guilt can be maintained by a repressed conscience of good and evil.

"Have I resisted God's will consciously and thus remained half-hearted?"

Prayer Before Confession, Pray With The Heart!: Medugorje Manual of Prayer, by Fr. Slavko Barbaric, O.F.M.

Resisting our natural desire for happiness (goodness) over unhappiness (evil) leaves us unhappy.

Besides intuition,
Avoiding contradictions through reason,
Both equally help us distinguish happiness from unhappiness.

However,

By uniting the more visible sensory things,
Under the more intuitive desire for goodness,
We find rest in our ultimate goal of happiness.

Originally Posted by Psychotheosophy

"Have I given freely of my material goods? Or have I spent them on unnecessary things, while I could have given them to the disposal of others for their daily bread?"

Prayer Before Confession, Pray With The Heart!: Medugorje Manual of Prayer, by Fr. Slavko Barbaric, O.F.M.

The ideal union between sensory things and goodness,
Is where goodness is above the sensory.
Not equal to the sensory.
So, while it is important to make necessary sensory things secondary,
Some unnecessary sensory things mentioned were cigarettes, make up, newspapers, and alcohol.
(Wine is used at mass, so the point is that there is a hierarchy among sensory things, as well, which can be united to goodness).

Originally Posted by Psychotheosophy

(Wine is used at mass, so the point is that there is a hierarchy among sensory things, as well, which can be united to goodness).

For example,

I have worn the Jubilee Medal of St. Benedict for many years.
It is not the ideal (perfect) union of sensory things with God (Jesus), but it has been blessed...

"We know that wherein (the Medal's) power lies, and we protest that the graces and favors are due, not to the gold or the silver, the brass or aluminum of the Medal, but to the faith in the merits of Christ crucified, to the efficacious prayer of the holy Father St. Benedict, and to the blessings which the holy Church bestows upon the Medal for those who wear it."

"No particular prayers are prescribed, for the very wearing and use of the Medal is considered a silent prayer to God to grant us, through the merits of St. Benedict, the favors we request."

"Those who devoutly wear the Medal of St. Benedict and pray for the propagation of his holy order share in all the good works, Masses, Communions, Divine Office, prayers and fasts of the entire Order."

The Life of St. Benedict, by St. Gregory The Great
(also see: 2 Kings 13:20-21; Matthew 9:21, 15:36; Mark 5:28-30; and Acts 19:11-12)

The medal must be used in faith in God.

Originally Posted by Psychotheosophy

"No particular prayers are prescribed, for the very wearing and use of the Medal is considered a silent prayer to God to grant us, through the merits of St. Benedict, the favors we request."

Inscribed on the Medal are series of letters which indicate prayers in Latin,
They are a protection against evil,
But they do not need to be said.

C.S.S.M.L. - N.D.S.M.D
Crux Sacra Sit Mihi Lux (May the holy Cross be my light)
Non Draco Sit Mihi Dux (Let not the dragon be my guide)

V.R.S.N.S.M.V. - S.M.Q.L.I.V.B.
Vade Retro Satana! (Begone, Satan!)
Nunquam Suade Mihi Vana. (Suggest not vain things to me.)
Sunt Mala Quae Libas; (Evil is the cup thou offerest;)
Ipse Venena Bibas. (Drink thou thine own poison.)

Eius in obitu nostro praesentia muniamur (May his presence protect us in the hour of our death.)

Pax (Peace)

Meriting salvation,
Is received when cooperative,
With the operative (the natural desire for happiness/goodness).

For receiving through the merits of another, see Genesis 22:16-18 and Matthew 10:40-42.