299 part i: sunday meditations for the entire year how often you had been near Mount Etna, near the Sicilian rocks, driven to the gate of hell by the storms stirred up by the evil one. And you would have been lost, engulfed by the grave darkness of your sins, in the waves of temptations, if the very bright lodestar,130 the Divine Mercy, did not shine for you and did not direct you into the way of truth (namely the rules of perfection) as you were wandering, and did not restore you when you were wounded and weak. Indeed, you were already totally devastated by frequent faults and crashes against the Charybdis of sensual pleasure, against the rocks of concupiscence and the sandbanks of unbridled licentiousness, to which you were driven after the sails of the fear of God were torn, after the mast of charity was broken, after the ropes of other virtues were torn asunder, by which faith and hope, very strong sails indeed, were held up. Therefore, ask Jesus the Craftsman that He remedy in Holy Communion everything that impedes your voyage to the port of a happy eternity. 3. “To [H]is own city” (Mt 9:1). Ponder that the city of Christ the Lord is that Jerusalem which St. John saw in his vision, “And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of Heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband” (Rev 21:2). To this town, then, Jesus has already crossed the sea. But in what way? By what means?Through torments, no doubt. It was necessary that “Christ ought to have suffered these things, and so to enter into [H]is glory” (cf. Lk 24:26). And you, do you want to be one of the citizens of that city? You easily can be; if having despised the Babylon that is the world, you would enter upon the hard, narrow, and thorny way that leads to life, that is, if you would undertake serious repentance and self-denial. For thus says the Savior: “If any man would come after [M]e, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow [M]e” (Mt 16:24). [f.84v] 130 Here St. Stanislaus used the word cynosura, which is the constellation Ursa Minor, i.e., the Little Bear, or the sign of the North Pole, and this group of seven stars contains an important pole star for navigators, serving as a guide or lodestar. Cf. SLL, vol. 1, Typis Seminarii apud JoannemManfrè, Patavii 1758, p. 206 (s.v. Cynosura).
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjI2Mw==