Devotion to the Saints: the thought of Padre Pio today September 13th

8. I really feel my heart crashing in feeling your sufferings, and I don't know what I would do to see you relieved. But why are you so upset? why do you crave? And away, my daughter, I have never seen you give so many jewels to Jesus as now. Never have I seen you so dear to Jesus as now. So what are you afraid of and trembling about? Your fear and trembling is similar to that of a child who is in his mother's arms. So yours is foolish and useless fear.

9. In particular, I have nothing to try again in you, apart from this somewhat bitter agitation in you, which does not make you taste all the sweetness of the cross. Make amends for this and continue to do as you have done up to now.

10. Then please do not worry about what I am going and I will be suffering, because suffering, however great it is, faced with the good that awaits us, is delightful for the soul.

11. As for your spirit, keep calm and entrust your whole self to Jesus more and more. Strive to conform yourself always and in all to the divine will, both in favorable and adverse things, and do not be solicitous for tomorrow.

12. Do not fear on your spirit: they are jokes, predilections and tests of the celestial Spouse, who wants to assimilate you to him. Jesus looks at the dispositions and the good wishes of your soul, which are excellent, and he accepts and rewards, and not your impossibility and incapacity. So don't worry.

13. Do not tire yourself around things that generate solicitude, disturbances and worries. Only one thing is necessary: ​​lift the spirit and love God.

14. You worry, my good daughter, to seek the highest Good. But, in truth, it is within you and it keeps you stretched out on the naked cross, breathing strength to sustain unsustainable martyrdom and love to love bitterly Love. So the fear of seeing him lost and disgusted without realizing it is as vain as he is close and close to you. The anxiety of the future is equally vain, since the present state is a crucifixion of love.

15. Poor unfortunate those souls who throw themselves into the whirlwind of worldly concerns; the more they love the world, the more their passions multiply, the more their desires ignite, the more incapable they find themselves in their plans; and here are the anxieties, the impatiences, the terrible shocks that break their hearts, which do not palpate with charity and holy love.
Let us pray for these wretched, miserable souls that Jesus will forgive and draw them with his infinite mercy to himself.

16. You don't have to act violently, if you don't want to take the risk of making money. It is necessary to put on great Christian prudence.

17. Remember, O children, that I am an enemy of unnecessary desires, no less than that of dangerous and evil desires, for although what is desired is good, nevertheless desire is always defective in regard to us, especially when it is mixed with overwhelming concern, since God does not demand this good, but another in which he wants us to practice.

18. As for the spiritual trials, to which the paternal goodness of the heavenly Father is subjecting you, I beg you to be resigned and possibly quiet to the assurances of those who hold the place of God, in which he loves you and desires you every good and in which name speaks to you.
You suffer, it is true, but resigned; suffer, but do not fear, because God is with you and you do not offend him, but love him; you suffer, but also believe that Jesus himself suffers in you and for you and with you. Jesus did not abandon you when you ran away from him, much less will abandon you now, and later on, that you want to love him.
God can reject everything in a creature, because everything tastes of corruption, but he can never reject in it the sincere desire to want to love him. So if you don't want to convince yourself and be sure of heavenly pity for other reasons, you must at least make sure of that and be calm and happy.

19. Nor should you confuse yourself with knowing whether you allowed or not. Your study and vigilance are directed towards the rectitude of intention that you must keep in operating and always fighting the evil arts of the bad spirit valiantly and generously.

20. Always be cheerfully at peace with your conscience, reflecting that you are at the service of an infinitely good Father, who by tenderness alone descends to his creature, to elevate it and transform it into him its creator.
And flee the sadness, because it enters the hearts that are attached to the things of the world.

21. We must not be discouraged, because if there is a continuous effort to improve in the soul, in the end the Lord rewards her by making all the virtues bloom in her suddenly as in a flower garden.