A Vision of the Judgment Seat of God

In her diary, ‘Divine Mercy in my Soul,” St. Maria Faustina Kowalska writes of when she was given the gift of appearing before the judgement seat of God: 36 Once I was summoned to the judgment [seat] of God. I stood alone before the Lord. Jesusappeared such as we know Him during His Passion. After …

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St. Faustina’s Vision of Purgatory Part 2

In Paragraph 21 of St. Maria Faustina Kowalska’s diary: “Divine Mercy in My Soul,” the Saint writes of when she was visited by a suffering soul : 21 …My superiors [probably Mother Leonard and MotherJane] sent me to the novitiate in Cracow. An inconceivable joy reigned in my soul. Whenwe arrived at the novitiate, Sister …

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St. Faustina’s Vision of Purgatory Part 1

In Paragraph 20 of St. Maria Faustina Kowalska’s diary: “Divine Mercy in My Soul,” the Saint writes of a vision of Purgatory that the Lord permitted her to see: 20…I saw my Guardian Angel, who ordered me to follow him. In a moment Iwas in a misty place full of fire in which there was …

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Soberversary! Seventeen years sober, today.

Today I achieved my seventeenth year of sobriety. That’s One Day At A Time repeated 6,209 times. A certain Twelve Step movement helped a lot at first; but I credit my endurance to Our Lord and Saviour’s Church, the Holy Catholic Church and to His Most Holy Mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary. I think a …

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St. Dorotheus

Earlier this week there appeared in the Office of Readings portion of the Liturgy of the Hours an excerpt from the teachings of St. Dorotheus, abbot. Every year when these show up in the Readings, I am struck by how relevant and similar they are to things you read in recovery texts. The link in …

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The dam breaks!

You’re sitting around or going along minding your own business. Then all of a sudden someone says something to you or some thing doesn’t cooperate and BLAMMO off you go on a tirade. (This never happens to me. LOL LOL LOL) From St. Dorotheus: “The man who thinks that he is quiet and peaceful has …

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"But, I'm innocent!"

St. Dorotheus understands that a common objection to his teachings on these subjects is that what if you do an examination of conscience and you find yourself innocent of anything and yet someone still had hurt you? What then? The Saint would say as he did in the latter 4 paragraphs in the link at …

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Humility as the root of peace

From the teachings of St. Dorotheus, abbot: “The man who finds fault with himself accepts all things cheerfully – misfortune, loss, disgrace, dishonor and any other kind of adversity. He believes that he is deserving of all these things and nothing can disturb him. No one could be more at peace than this man. “ …

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Virtue without examination is wasted

St. Dorotheus reiterates the importance of an examination of conscience (what he call “self-accusation”). It does not matter how many virtues a man may have, even if they are beyond number and limit. If he has turned from the path of self-accusation, he will never find peace. He will always be troubled himself, or else …

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The source of all annoyance and distress

Continuing on in this series, St. Dorotheus goes on to say that the only path to peace (an internal peace) is for us to be what we would call nowadays reflective. We must be always aware of our defects and seek to remedy them. And we must look internally, be aware of what is wrong …

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