377 part ii: meditations for more solemn feasts is as if He were saying: “You have sinned by incredulity; make up for your sin by faith, proclaiming Me and My salutary teaching to the whole world. You have failed by the hardness of your heart, but go now to open the hearts of men and break their hardness with the hammer of the Gospel.” This is exactly what it means to rebuke a vice and to suggest at once a remedy; to recognize the sickness and to immediately apply the medicine. Apply this to yourself and to the others, so that having detected and reproved your own or someone else’s imperfections, immediately show the way to remove them and to atone for them by true virtues. Imitate Christ the Lord in this regard; imitate good physicians whose diagnosis of a sickness would be useless unless they also provided a medicine to the sick. [f.119v] 2. “but he who does not believe will condemned” (Mk 16:16). You are very fortunate for at this time you contain within yourself the Lord of Heaven and earth. You are fortunate for having such a Guest, fortunate for having such a Lord! But what made you a part of this good fortune? Faith alone. “Blessed are those,” (says your Most Holy Guest) “who have not seen and yet believe” (Jn 20:29). Thanks to your faith in the existence of God, Whom you have not seen with your eyes, you have been made fortunate. Since you have this faith from God Himself, what worthy thanks will you give to Him, especially after hearing that those who “do not believe” shall be condemned? Indeed, you would not be able to repay this divine benefice in any other or more appropriate way than by praying for the infidels, that they may be enlightened; or by contributing to their conversion though your own work as did the one who, having become an Apostle after being a publican, was bringing the publicans to Christ for the sake of their conversion in order to repay in this way the gift of his own vocation. He wished unto others what he deemed salutary for himself. 3. “preach the [G]ospel to the whole creation” (Mk 16:15). How great is the kindness of the Son of God towards all mankind! He does not want to exclude anybody, not even the most miserable and despicable, from the heavenly Fatherland since He
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