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Question
Dear Father Bellon,
My name is M.B. and since some days I have asked to join the group of translators for the website project of translation in German.
My proposal has been accepted. I am writing this email because I would like to ask you if I can be added to the Militia Angelica, because I want to start a path of true marital chastity.
Unfortunately it has been only one year since I converted. Last year I got married but unfortunately only in my l town hall, because I was still in the emptiness of atheism. Now I am trying to convince my wife to celebrate a proper wedding. It will be hard, but this is comprehensible from my point of view. In the meantime, I have clearly expressed to her the will to practice chastity until we get to this step, that for me it is now of great importance.
Every day I pray that we can receive the Sacrament of Christian Marriage .
I thank you for having read something about me and you can find below my contacts.
Best regards
M.
Priest’s answer
Dear friend,
1. I thank you for the collaboration with our website. This way, you cooperate concretely to establish the Lord’s Reign in every man’s heart.
I am sure that God will be pleased with that.
I am happy that the Lord allows you to always feel his proximity: first with the conversion from the emptiness of atheism, secondly with the desire to live according to the ways of God with the woman who is still not fully your wife and lastly with the collaboration in creating a version of the website in another language.
2. I highlight the expression that you used about the civil ritual of your wedding: “because I was still in the emptiness of atheism”.
This expression corresponds so much to the truth!
It is really like this. Because atheism doesn’t give anything to someone while on the contrary deprives him of everything.
3. I reply to you on the day of the memory of the martyrdom of St. John the Baptist.
The Gospel of this celebration states that Herod was pleased watching his daughter Hèrodiade, who was living with him, dancing and he promised her that he would have given her anything she would have asked. He said this with a hyperbolic expression: “up to half my kingdom”.
Differently from Herod, Jesus promises to those who follow him not only half of a kingdom on Earth, evanescent and that in any case we will have to leave, but he promises all his Kingdom that is eternal and indestructible.
He said indeed: “You are those who have stood by me in my trials and I confer on you a kingdom, just as my Father conferred one on me, so that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom and sit on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.” (Luke 22:28-30)
In ancient times, eating and drinking at the king’s banquet was the same as sharing his powers. Here it is about being part of the powers of God Himself in ruling the world.
This is what all Saints in Heaven are doing.
This is what you can do already in this world mainly through Holy Communion.
4. St. Teresa of Avila says: “Don’t miss such a good occasion as the one you have after the Holy Communion, to think about your own business” (Way of perfection, 34, 10)
St. Faustina Kowalska revealed that one day God told her: “I desire to unite Myself with human souls; My great delight is to unite Myself with souls. Know, My daughter, that when I come to a human heart in Holy Communion, My hands are full of all kinds of graces which I want to give to the soul. But souls do not even pay any attention to Me; they leave Me to Myself and busy themselves with other things. Oh, how sad I am that souls do not recognize Love! They treat Me as a dead object. (19.11.1937).
I highlight two expressions of this nice extract: “My hands are full of graces” and “of all kinds”.
These are temporal and supernatural graces. We are all invited to try whether this is true, when we receive God in a virtuous way, in the grace of God, without mortal sins that tarnish the soul and don’t allow the Lord to be present and effective.
5. Now you are in a position that allows you to go to Confession and receive Holy Communion, although not where you are recognized as married only with civil ritual.
Even if you are not in a regular situation, you now have the determination to live according to God’s ways and in chastity, so you can experience how it is true what St. Teresa of Avila and St. Faustina Kowalska said.
In your Holy Communions, the first thought can be addressed to the one who lives by your side and who needs to find the faith in herself, and so to see her life and her future with God’s eyes.
The grace of Holy Communion is such a great gift that it is worthy of giving up all sins.
Indeed “What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit their very self? (Luke 9:25)
6. Don’t forget the great promise made by Jesus:” If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.”
(Johannes 15:10-11).
Jesus promises fullness of life for the present and future life.
Atheism, on the other hand, does not ensure anything in this life and prepares the self-deprivation of God in the future and the subsequent privation of all goods.
I thank you for this witness that comes directly from your experience of atheism and faith.
I wish you all good, I remind you before the Lord and I bless you.
Father Angelo