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Dear Readers,
Below are two Sets of Excerpts from the Book of Heaven
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DIFFERENCE between knowledge of self and humility. Jesus alone can glory in possessing true humility.
LUISA: Finding myself in my usual state, my lovable Jesus came in a pitiful state. He had His hands bound tightly, His face covered with spit, and several people were slapping Him horribly. And He remained quiet, placid, without making one movement or emitting one lament not even a batting of eyelashes, in order to show that He Himself wanted to suffer these outrages; and this, not only externally, but also internally. What a moving scene, such as to break the hardest hearts! How many things that Face said, with that spit hanging, dirtied with mud! I felt horrified, I trembled, I saw myself all pride before Jesus.
While He was in that appearance, JESUS said to me: “My daughter, only the little ones let themselves be handled as one wants; not those who are little of human reason, but those who are little yet filled with divine reason. I alone can say that I am humble, because in man, that which is said to be humility should rather be called knowledge of self; and one who does not know himself already walks in falsehood.”
Jesus remained silent for a few minutes, and I stayed there, contemplating Him. While I was doing this, I saw a hand carrying a light, which, searching in my interior, in the most intimate hiding places, wanted to see whether the knowledge of myself and love of humiliations, confusions and opprobriums, were present in me. That light found a void in my interior – and I too saw it – which had to be filled with humiliations and confusions, in the example of blessed Jesus. Oh! How many things that light and that holy Face which was before me, made me comprehend!
LUISA: I said to myself: A God, humiliated and confused for love of me; and I, a sinner, without these insignia! A God, stable, firm in bearing so many insults, so much so that He does not move even a bit to shake that disgusting spit off of Himself. Ah! His interior before God and His exterior before men are made manifest to me; and yet, if He wants to free Himself, He can, because it is not the chains that bind Him, but His firm Will, which wants to save mankind at any cost. And I? And I? Where are my humiliations? Where, the firmness, the constancy in doing good for love of my Jesus and for love of my neighbor?
Ah! how different we are as victims – myself and Jesus! Ah! we are not similar at all!
While my little brain was lost in this, my adorable JESUS told me: “Only my Humanity was filled with opprobriums and humiliations, to the point that they overflowed outside. This is why Heaven and earth tremble before my virtues, and the souls who love Me use my Humanity as the staircase in order to ascend and lap up a few little drops of my virtues. Tell me now: before my humility, where is yours? I alone can glory in possessing true humility. My Divinity, united to my Humanity, could operate prodigies at each step, word and work; yet, I voluntarily constrained Myself within the circle of my Humanity, I showed Myself as the poorest, and I reached the point of mingling even with sinners.
JESUS: I could have done the work of Redemption in very little time, and even with one single word; yet, during the course of many years, with many hardships and sufferings, I wanted to make the miseries of man my own; I wanted to exercise Myself in many different actions, so that man might be completely renewed, divinized, even in the lowest works. In fact, once they had been exercised by Me, who was God and Man, they received new splendor, and remained with the imprint of divine works. My Divinity, hidden within my Humanity, wanted to lower Itself to such lowness, subjecting Itself to the course of human actions – while with one single act of my Will I could have created infinite worlds – feeling the miseries and the weaknesses of others as if they were Its own, seeing Itself covered with all the sins of men before Divine Justice, having to pay their penalty at the price of unheard-of pains and with the shedding of all Its Blood. Thus It exercised continuous acts of profound and heroic humility.
Here, oh daughter, is the immense difference between my humility and the humility of creatures, which is only a shadow in the face of mine, even that of all my Saints; because the creature is always a creature and does not know, as I know, how great is the weight of sin. Even though heroic souls, following my example, have offered themselves to suffer the pains of others, their pains are not different from those of the other creatures; they are not new things for them, because they are made of the same clay. Besides, the mere thought that those pains are the cause of new gains, and that they glorify God, is a great honor for them.
Furthermore, the creature is restricted within the circle in which God placed her, and she cannot go out of those limits within which she has been circumscribed by God. Oh! if it were in their power to do or undo things, how many other things they would do – everyone would reach the stars! But my divinized Humanity had no limits, yet It voluntarily constrained Itself within Itself; and this was the braiding of all my works with heroic humility.
This had been the cause of all the evils that inundate the earth – lack of humility; and I, by exercising this virtue, was to draw all goods from Divine Justice. Ah! yes, no concessions of graces depart from my throne, if not by means of humility, nor can any ticket be received by Me, if it does not carry the signature of humility. No prayer is listened to by my ears, and moves my Heart to compassion, if it is not perfumed by the fragrance of humility. If the creature does not arrive at destroying that seed of honor, of esteem – and this can be destroyed by arriving at loving to be despised, humiliated, confused – she will feel a braiding of thorns around her heart; she will perceive a void in her heart that will always bother her, and will render her very dissimilar to my Most Holy Humanity. And if she does not arrive at loving humiliations, at the most she will be able to know herself a little bit, but will not shine before Me, clothed with the garment of humility, beautiful and worthy of sympathy.”
LUISA: Who can say how many things I comprehended about this virtue, and the difference between knowledge of self and humility? I seemed to touch with my own hand the distinction between these two virtues, but I have no words to explain myself.
In order to say something, I will use an image. For example: a poor man says he is poor, and he frankly manifests his poverty, also to people who do not know him and who perhaps may believe that he possesses something. It can be said that he knows himself and tells the truth; and because of this, he is loved more, he moves others to compassion for his miserable state, and everyone helps him. So it is to know oneself. If, then, feeling ashamed to manifest his poverty, that poor man boasted of being rich, while everyone knows that he does not even have clothes to cover himself and that he is dying of hunger – what happens? Everyone despises him, nobody helps him, and he becomes an object of mockery and ridicule to anyone who knows him; and the miserable one, going from bad to worse, ends up dying. So is pride before God and also before other men. And here is how one who does not know himself already goes out of the truth and falls into the path of falsehood.
LUISA: Now, here is the difference with humility, though it seems to me that knowledge of self and humility are sisters born of the same womb, and one can never be humble if he does not know himself. For example: there is a rich man who, out of love for humiliations, stripping himself of his noble garments, covers himself with miserable rags. He lives unknown, manifesting to no one who he is; he mingles with the poorest, he lives with the poor as if he were one of them, and makes scorns and confusions his delights. Here is the beautiful sister of the knowledge of self – that is, humility.
Ah! yes, humility draws grace; humility breaks the strongest chains, which are sin. Humility surmounts any wall of division between the soul and God, and brings her back to Him. Humility is the little plant, but always green and flowery, not subject to being gnawed by worms; nor will winds, hail or heat be able to do harm to it, or make it wither even slightly. Humility, though it is the littlest plant, sends out extremely high branches, which penetrate even into Heaven and braid around the Heart of Our Lord; and only the branches that come from this little plant have free access into that adorable Heart.
Humility is the anchor of peace in the storms of the waves of the sea of this life. Humility is the salt that spices all virtues and preserves the soul from the corruption of sin. Humility is the little grass that sprouts along the path treaded by wayfarers, such that, as it is trampled, it disappears, but soon it can be seen sprouting again, more beautiful than before. Humility is like a gentle graft that refines the wild plant. Humility is the sunset of guilt. Humility is the newborn of grace. Humility is like the moon that guides us in the darkness of the night of this life. Humility is like that shrewd merchant who knows well how to trade his riches, and does not waste even one penny of the grace that is given to him. Humility is the key to the door of Heaven, such that no one can enter into It if he does not keep this key in good custody. Finally – otherwise I would never end it, and I would be too long – humility is the smile of God and of all the Empyreum, and it is the crying of all hell.
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DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE SACRAMENTS AND THE DIVINE WILL
LUISA: I thought to myself: “What is the difference between the Sacraments and the Divine Will?”
JESUS: The Sacraments are the effects of My Will; but My Will is life, and, as life, with Its creative power It forms and gives life to the Sacraments. The Sacraments do not have the power to give life to My Will, because It is eternal. It has no beginning or end.
And this is why in the ardor of Its love, with Its continuous dominion, one can say that the Divine Will confers a continuous Baptism, an unbroken absolution, and Communion at every moment—especially because this Will of Ours was given to man at the beginning of his Creation as permanent life living within him.
This was the substance, the fruit of creation: Our Will that must form Our life within man. With this life We gave everything. There was nothing that man could have needed that he would not find in this Will of Ours. One could say that he would have found at his disposition all that he could have wanted: Help, strength, light, and sanctity.
Now, My daughter, you must know that Our Divine Being, as He created man, remained over him in the act of pouring out Our sanctity, light, love, goodness, beauty, and all the rest. So, by withdrawing from Our Divine Will, he withdrew from under Our outpouring.
SECRETS
LUISA: O admirable secret of the Will of my Lord—how indescribable is Your happiness!
JESUS: My daughter, in the soul who is completely transformed in My Will I find sweet rest.
Moreover, by your being absorbed in Me, and I in you, we would form one single entity, and you would come to possess the divine source of all things within yourself. And since My Will contains every good thing that can ever be, you would come to possess all goods, gifts, and graces, and you would not have to look for them anywhere but within yourself.
My Will makes one acquire the most heroic, sublime and unsurpassable virtues.
The height of the perfection of a soul dissolved in My Will is so great that she comes to participate in all of God’s works. She enters the secrets of the Most August Trinity, and participates in the reciprocal love of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. O how all the Angels and Saints honor her, men admire her, and demons fear her, seeing the Divine Being within her! And this is no wonder, because it is no longer her will that lives in her but the Will of God Himself. No one should be amazed if, by living with this Will, she possesses the power, the wisdom, the sanctity and all the other virtues that God Himself contains.
When she reaches the stage of living by My Will alone, the soul becomes the queen of all queens, and she mounts a throne so high that it reaches the throne of the Eternal One; she enters the secrets of the Most August Trinity, and participates in the reciprocal love of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Moreover, I want to teach you the secret of always being with Jesus and how always to live content and happy, even on this earth. You should resolve within yourself that Jesus and you are alone in the world, that there is no one else, and that you should please, love, and delight Him alone. And on Him alone should you wait to be loved in return and contented in everything.
In this frame of mind—you and Jesus alone—you will not be influenced even if you find yourself surrounded by contempt or praise, relatives or strangers, friends or enemies. Jesus alone will form your every contentment and Jesus alone will make up for everyone. My daughter, until every earthly thing that exists completely vanishes from the soul, true and lasting happiness cannot be found.”
Don’t you know that when I draw, unite, and identify a soul with Me, communicating My secrets, the first key I strike, which sounds more beautiful than all the others and which communicates its sound to the other keys, is the key of obedience? This is so true that if the other keys are not in communication with the first one, they will sound discordant and will not be pleasing to My ear.
The Will of God forms the soul’s paradise on earth, and the soul who does God’s Will forms God’s paradise on earth. The Will of God is the only key that opens the treasury of divine secrets, and the soul who does God’s Will gains such familiarity in the house of God that she comes to rule over it as if she were the owner.
When I communicate Myself to souls, I do not look at dignities—whether they are bishops or popes; but I look at whether they are detached from everyone and everything. I look to see whether everything—everything in them is love for Me.
I look to see whether they hesitate to give Me even a single breath, or a single heartbeat. And if I find them all love, I do not care whether they are ignorant, abject, poor, despised or dirty. I can convert even dirt into gold; I transform it in Me; I communicate all of Myself to it; I entrust to it My most intimate secrets; I make it share in My joys and in My sorrows.
This is why I delight in communicating Myself to these souls, and I raise them above all dignities.
LUISA “I would like to know which soul Jesus has favored the most.”
JESUS: My daughter, do you know who has been most favored by Me? The soul to whom I have shown the power and the prodigies of My Most Holy Will. Everything else forms a part of Me, but My Will is the center, the life and the foundation of everything.
How much you should thank Me for having admitted you to the secrets of My Will !
As the soul dies in My Will, no beauty, height, wealth, sanctity, wisdom or love can equal her—nothing. Nothing can be compared to her—nothing equals her. And when the soul who dies identified with My Will enters the Heavenly Fatherland, not only will the gates of Heaven open to her, but the whole heavenly court will bow to welcome her into her celestial home, to honor the work of My Will in her.
Ah, My daughter, My Will is the wonder of wonders. It holds the secret to light, sanctity and riches; It holds the secret to all good things—but It is not yet intimately known, and therefore cannot be appreciated or loved as It deserves! But I want You to appreciate It, to love It, and to make It known to souls whom you find open to receive.
You have captivated My Will. If you had captivated My love, My power, My wisdom, or some other quality, you would have captivated a part of Me. But by captivating My Will, you have captivated the whole substance of My Being.
Then He added: In the one who does My Will and lives in It, My love does not meet any obstacles.
And I consecrate souls as they keep repeating their acts in My Will, as they resign themselves, and as they set their human will aside, to let the Divine Will enter. What the priest does over the Host, I do to them—but not only one time. Every time a soul repeats her acts in My Will, she attracts Me like a powerful magnet, and I consecrate her as a privileged Host, repeating over her the words of the Consecration.
My Will is everywhere, and the acts done in My Will run everywhere—both in Heaven and on earth. They run to the past, because My Will has always existed; to the present, because My Will has lost nothing of Its activity; to the future, because It will exist eternally. How beautiful are the acts in My Will! And since My Will contains ever new delights, these acts form new delights even for the blessed. They replace the acts of the saints which have not been done in My Will, and they bring forth new graces for all creatures.
Every time the soul enters into My Will, she comes to reflect herself in the mirror of My Divinity; and in reflecting herself, she receives the divine features, and these features bind her to the Divinity. And when they find Their own physiognomy in her, the Divine Persons recognize her as a member of Their family; They give her a place in Their midst, and admit her to Their secrets.
The soul who lives in Our Will puts herself in order, according to the purpose for which We created man. Our Will and hers are one alone.
I want to tell you which truths glorify Me the most: those that concern My Will, since the primary reason for which I created man was that his will be one with his Creator.
I have opened the doors of My Will, and I have revealed to you the secrets, the wonders that My Will contains.
Ah! My daughter, it is My Will that I want everyone to know and to point out—as a new Heaven and as a means to a new regeneration. (The Father wants to start all over again.)
For this reason My Will destroys every barrier between the soul and God; It puts her in harmony with Heaven and earth; It reveals all the secrets that the whole Creation contains, and makes her the treasury of all God’s gifts.
So I tell You, “I love You” in every particle of sun-light; “I love You” in the flickering of the stars; “I love You” in every drop of water. Your Will lets me see Your “I love you” for me even in the depths of the ocean, and I impress my “I love You” for You, in every fish that darts about in the sea. I want to place my “I love You” on the flight of every bird—”I love You” everywhere, my Love. I want to place my “I love You” on the wings of the wind, in the stirring of the leaves, in every spark of fire—”I love You” for myself and for everyone.”
My Will is the life and motion of all things. But do you know who follows Its motion and who soars in My Eternal Will, so that she wanders about in the sphere of eternity just as It does, being present wherever It is, and doing whatever It does? It is the soul who is completely abandoned in My Holy Will. This abandonment forms the wings she uses to fly in union with My Will.
But if she stops abandoning herself, she stops soaring above and her wings are ruined. Indeed, everyone feels the motion and the life of My Will—because there is no motion that does not come from Me—but they remain where they are. Only one who has the wings that come from abandonment in Me, and who follows in the path of My Will, flies over everything in Heaven and on earth, enters the sphere of Eternity, and wanders about in the midst of the three Divine Persons. Such a soul reaches into Their most intimate hiding places, and becomes aware of Their secrets and Their beatitudes.
The light of the Divine Will is the passport that allows the soul to enter into everything—into the most secret recesses—and by Its power to multiply the life of Jesus.
My Will is most pure light, and this light contains all-seeingness. It is the passport to enter the most intimate hiding places, the most secret recesses, the most profound depths and into the realm of the highest heights.
So, place your thoughts, words, heartbeats, and pains—your whole being—in circulation in My Will. Leave nothing within yourself—so that, by the passport of the light of My Will and by My divine power, you may enter every act of every soul and multiply My life in each one of them. O how happy I will be when I see a soul filling Heaven and earth with as many of My lives as there are souls—by the power of My Will!
In this encounter she imitates the virtues of her Creator, absorbs ever new Divine Life into herself, penetrates more deeply into the eternal secrets of the Supreme Will, and does everything no longer in a human way but divinely. This divine activity forms a golden heaven within her where the Divinity roams, delighting to find His own activity in a creature, and waiting to receive divine acts from her, so that He can open new channels for her within His Divinity.
For this reason, My Will destroys every barrier between the soul and God; It puts her in harmony with Heaven and earth; It reveals all the secrets that the whole Creation contains, and makes her the treasury of all God’s gifts.
When I reveal My truths, My love finds its outpouring and makes merry, and I deeply love the soul who is willing to listen to Me.
And when they read the meditations on my Passion, since I am within you, I pour Myself up to the brim of your soul, and I speak to you about my most intimate secrets—things that I have not revealed to anyone until now—things that show souls how they must follow Me in my work. Those meditations will be the mirror of my interior Life, and whoever will reflect himself in that mirror will copy my own Life within himself.
There are no dissimilar things between us. And that is why I want you completely in my Will, if you want to take part in my blessings.
JESUS: Ah, my daughter, my Will is the wonder of wonders. It holds the secret to light, sanctity and riches.
My beloved, the soul who lives in my Will rests, because the Divine Will does everything for her, and while It works for her, I find in her the most beautiful rest. So, the Will of God is rest for the soul, and gives God rest in the soul.
THE CROSS
JESUS: I have spoken to you (Luisa) many times about the Cross. Today, let Me hear you speak of the Cross.
LUISA: I felt totally confused and did not know what to say. But as Jesus sent me a ray of intellectual light, to please Him I began to say: “My Beloved, who can describe the Cross to You? Your lips alone can speak worthily of the sublimity of the Cross—but since You want me to speak, I will do it.
The Cross that You suffered freed me from slavery to the devil and espoused me to the Divinity with an indissoluble bond. The fecund Cross gives birth to Grace in me. The Cross is Light, disillusioning me with temporal things, and showing me eternal things. The Cross is fire—burning to ashes all that is not of God, and emptying my heart of the tiniest blade of grass that might take root in it. The Cross is a coin of inestimable value, and if I have the good fortune of possessing it, O Holy Spouse, I will be enriched with eternal wealth. I will even become the richest soul in Paradise—because the currency that circulates in Heaven is the Cross that one has suffered on earth.
Indeed, the Cross not only makes me know myself; but even makes me know God. The Cross grafts all the virtues into me. The Cross is the noble pulpit of uncreated Wisdom, teaching me the highest, finest and most sublime doctrines. Truly, only the Cross will teach me the most hidden mysteries, the most secret things, the most perfect perfection, hidden from the most erudite and learned souls of the world. The Cross is like healing water that purifies me. Indeed, it not only heals me, but nourishes the virtues, making them grow in me, leaving me only when the time comes to bring me back to Eternal Life.
The Cross is like celestial dew, which preserves and embellishes in me the beautiful lily of purity. The Cross is the food of Hope. The Cross is the beacon of operating Faith. The Cross is like hard wood, preserving the fire of Charity, and keeping it always aflame. The Cross is like dry wood, which dispels and puts to flight all the smoke of pride and of vainglory, producing the humble violet of humility in the soul. The Cross is the most powerful weapon against the demons, defending me from all of their claws. That is why the soul who possesses the Cross is the envy and admiration of the very Angels and Saints, provoking the rage and indignation of the demons.
The Cross is my Paradise on earth. Indeed, if the Paradise of the Blessed up there is one of delights, the Paradise down here is one of sufferings. My Supreme Good, the Cross is the chain of purest gold that connects me to You. It forges the most intimate union that can possibly be attained, to the point of making my being disappear in Yours. The Cross transforms me in You, my Beloved, to the point that I feel lost within You—and I live by You your very own Life.”
— Submitted by Thomas Fahy
Note: The words attributed to Our Lord seem certain to us. The final assessment on this is up to the Official Church.
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