“The shortest road is faithfulness to the inspirations of the Holy Spirit.” (Saint Faustina, Diary Entry 291).
Sometimes it seems so difficult to be good.
You would think that a bit of goodness should be relatively easy for us because we know that Heaven exists, and God is waiting for us in Heaven and wants us to be good and get to Heaven by following His HOLY and GOOD Will. And yet – even so – knowing all the goodness that is required of me to get to Heaven, even knowing that I risk eternal damnation for even the smallest sin, it seems to me almost impossible to hold out despite all the temptation of the world to ensure that I am good.
And I have been thinking about this concept of Goodness… Saint Faustina wrote in her diary at Diary Entry 291, “My Jesus, it is truly easy to become holy; it just takes a little good will! And if He finds this minimum of good will in a soul, He quickly gives Himself to her. And nothing can stop Him, neither our faults nor our falls, absolutely nothing. Jesus hurries to help that soul; and if the soul is faithful to this grace from God, she can in a short time reach the highest levels of holiness that a created being can attain here below. God is very generous and does not refuse His grace to anyone. He gives even more than we ask for. The shortest road is faithfulness to the inspirations of the Holy Spirit.”
And I have been thinking about the generosity of God. It sort of comes down to habits. For example, if I get into he habit of daily prayer and I can maintain that habit, then it places me in a position where I am more likely to make other choices that align with that original GOOD habit. It hardly seems likely that I would engage in daily prayer and then take illicit drugs immediately afterwards. I would probably be still reflecting on my daily prayers for some time afterwards and want to choice to adopt other more positive habits afterwards.
One has only to think of the Holy Mass. If I attend Mass each day, then I am likely to have spent at least a few minutes of my day reflecting on the Gospel and the Sacrament of the Most Holy Eucharist. And having reflected on those things, I am more likely to be able to choose good rather than the alternative, because I have placed myself in an occasion for goodness.
And I have been thinking about that today. Because it seems to me that Saint Faustina is quite right… It is not very difficult to be good after all. One has only to have a little goodwill and God Himself will do the rest of make me Holy. And when I think about that I am struck dumb with awe. For that means that even a miserable soul like mine can be good. And that is possibly the greatest miracle of all the world.
For with prayer, I stand on Holy Ground where everything is clear. Here. At the Foot of the Cross.
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