Course V - Teaching 13: Renunciation as Holocaust

Renunciation, as a permanent, living holocaust, is not only a unique good and mean of salvation for a soul that has assumed it, but also the unique mean to help the world and redeem Humanity.
It is not absolutely true that a consecrated Son avoids his responsibility for the society. Let us leave slanderers of the truth and blind men of the world speaking and acting wickedly against those souls that have renounced to the world. The Son must acquire such steadiness and determination so that none can distort his belief because Truth is the Truth.
The history of the world and the history of the souls proclaim it throughout times. Only those who leave everything behind to fulfill their mission achieve something; and the rest are only parasites. The latter are poor people shaken by the storm of destiny and events; they live by the product of some few souls that surrender their lives as a holocaust to God for the salvation of Humanity. In the whirlpool of the world –where men state that to make, work and be helpful is vice, ruin, disorder and hatred– always there are heroic souls surrendering their lives as a holocaust for saving Humanity; always there are heroic souls that are able to give their lives in a holocaust to Humanity. Always a hero, a saint or a martyr appears. How many times you should admire and say about those beings that have surrendered their lives to save someone else: “Someone still knows what is nobleness and sacrifice”.
Recently, a modest Italian schoolmistress was taking care of her pupils at a summer camp. Suddenly a gas pipe breaks up and children begin to faint away. From her window she observes this serious situation and understands that she can die if gets down and tries to open the doors. But she does not hesitate and takes those children out, one by one. On route to the hospital she asks: “Are the children well?” and someone else replies: “Do not think of the children, think of you”. Then she says: “My life does not matter: lives of those children are important!” And she dies in peace.
But this death is not the most valuable but mystical death of Renunciation. You may surrender your life at a moment of elation, enthusiasm and dignity, and this is something great and extraordinary; but to die a little every day, every instant, and to stay on a cross shedding a daily drop of blood, here is a lofty death.
When a man surrendered his will and renounced to life, his sacrifice is total because he possesses nothing and all his actions are for love and for a higher will, not for self-satisfaction. When you can say; “I possess nothing”, this is the greatest death.
Once a Son said he would wish to give his head to a hospital, but his Spiritual Director replied: “You are not free for this. After your death, your Divine Mother will instruct about your head”.
Renunciation is a permanent holocaust of life; and to die little by little, daily, every hour, and every instant. And here is the only good for the world, because those who renounce do not offer their lives through an act of heroic love, at a moment of sublimation and extraordinary enthusiasm: they offer themselves every day of their lives and forever. Not to die, but die, is something very great and extraordinary. Those souls that have offered themselves as a holocaust to God are the only ones who can understand this. That is why Saint Therese says to God: “I die because I do not die”: death is more tremendous when you renounced to everything. Then you would wish to be free of earthly ties and miseries of the world, but you cannot do it; you can do this only like a dove that, raising a song to heaven, asks God, like Saint Therese, “please, break my ties and bonds”.
Whoever makes something does not magnify it; so, consecrated souls only live their lives and are not aware of the value of detachment and renunciation to the world. The world is blind, and slanders those beings that renounce to passion and to what the former call life. There is a permanent contradiction between the world and chosen souls, but also you can see that at a moment of need and pain, those persons have to come to those who were slandered and to ask protection of those who possess nothing but that possess everything in God.
Nothing is more false that to state that those who renounced have eluded their responsibilities. Their responsibilities are infinite because of their Renunciation; before they had responsibility for the world, society and human family; but this responsibility changes and becomes impermanent; it lasts for a while and later disappears. By this act of Renunciation, these Sons who are responsible for Humanity become divinely responsible directors and leaders of Humanity. They are not exempt of any responsibility by virtue of their detachment: they are totally obliged to save the world.
Renunciation to oneself is something very great; but renunciation to save the world is something loftier and diviner. The Buddha has said this with total clarity: “I go to Nirvana, but my Nirvana will not be total until all souls may possess it”. For a Son, Renunciation, true liberation is only a little drop of water of the everlasting ocean because it will not be total until all souls achieve it; even one soul cannot remain without liberation; only then the Son will say: “I did it and attained the end”.
Although the Son is disconnected from the world, how great is his responsibility! But this ideal responsibility for the time being, must be continuously increased by a life of detachment, by more and more personal perfection, and by more and more total surrender.
The Sons must begin knowing their duties before Humanity, and exercise their souls for their appointed work to save the world.
They became co-redeemers of Humanity through their life, offering and Vow. Christ states continuously to his disciples: “mine”. Before his return to the Father, in his great prayer he says: “I recommend you these disciples of mine”, “to them –to the people– I speak through parables, but to you –disciples– I speak directly”. Why does the Divine Master make this difference? Perchance are not all souls equal? He does not make this difference because they may be different, but because he knows that they have more responsibilities: they are their companions in redemption of Humanity.
“Much will be asked of those who got much.” The Son is associated to the work of the Divine Incarnation on earth. If the Son leaves all and abandons the world is not by virtue of a whim or human enthusiasm, but to become partner of the Divinity. He leaves his ordinary responsibilities of family, society and world, but to assume greater, higher and diviner responsibilities. Because of this renunciation, he is obliged not only to be good, but also perfect. The rich young man said: “Good Master, what good thing shall I do, that I may have eternal life?” The Master said: “Keep the commandments”, and when the young man replied that he had “kept them from his youth up”, Christ said: “You lack one thing yet: go and sell that you hast, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me”. “But when the young man heard that saying, he went away very sorrowful: for he had great possessions” and had no courage to leave them behind. Then Christ said: “See how few men in the world can follow the truth; but those who follow it, are disciples of mine: co-redeemers of Humanity”.
The Sons are his disciples; they have left everything behind to become co-redeemers with the Divine Incarnation, with Maitreya that will come.
But for this reason the Sons did not leave their family, race and society. They have left the material aspect, not the spiritual one. Under a divine law, they are obliged to their progenitors and relatives, because God says in his commandments: “Honor thy father and thy mother”. But because of their lives of renunciation, they lack a father and a mother, because God is their father and their mother. But this does not cancel higher spiritual responsibilities. They have sublimated their family affections and left all those persons, but from the Holy House they are obliged to them and responsible for them, because these Sons became responsible for the spiritual bread of those beings.
Those Sons who live in the world must be responsible for their parents under natural law, and have to help them in their needs in the old age; but the Ordained Son must watch over their eternal salvation, so that they may open their eyes to the Truth; he has to give them the bread of the spirit and honor them in spirit. What does it matter if a father, a mother or a brother possesses everything? The Providence gives in abundance when those beings offer their children; then they do not lack bread: it is the eternal law. A son that abandons his parents for the world commits a crime, but if he abandons the world for God, then God protects him, but he is not exempt of responsibility for it. So, he says: “They are healthy, but, what about their soul, their spirit?” Is it likely that parents of a consecrated being may get lost, and that, after his mission on earth, the Son goes to heaven, to work in the hereafter and unfortunately does not find there his dear ones at the right of God? In fact, this is more painful than the lack of material bread. Sometimes, the Sons are worried about trivialities of their relatives, suffer grieve about unimportant things and do not pay attention to the true things. Their work is this: “I am sorry because at home there are these defects and evils that they are unable to remove. I am mainly responsible for this. How was I unable to do anything? Why did not I worry about their salvation and redemption?”
The Sons must offer their blood, pain and sacrifice for the salvation of their parents; they cannot die, but it is thousand times worse if the soul dies and remains in the dark. The Son must go in spirit and thought by means of his letters; his preaching should not be entirely based on love: he must plainly speak to them and say: “You are on the wrong way; you are living for the world, not for God”. A consecrated soul does not fear, like those of the world, to see his parents at his final hour, but says to them: “Your life is over; beware, dead may come and encounter you unprepared”. A Son must not be afraid that they may leave after they finished their mission. His words have to be of everlasting life; his duty is to give salvation to his fathers, if still they are young. Of course, he shall not say they have to become Ordained Sons, but they should be free from prejudices, material interests and sympathies; they should demonstrate the selfishness of old age regarding youth, which just tries to tie young people there, their lack of charity when they feel happy leaving their own faults and ties on the shoulders of their children.
Here are those things that the Sons must teach through letters, conversations and prayers. They must offer sacrifices, if necessary, for their salvation. It is tremendous to think that their parents will not be among the chosen. If the Sons have to be Directors of souls, first of all they must try with their parents, and if they do not get any result, then they must come back to the beginning, that is, to the offering; and must pray for their salvation and for their knowledge of the Truth, not to fall in the hereafter in the great void of despair. Dom Bosco’s mother properly said: “I am sure of my salvation because I gave a son to God”. Saint Therese of Lisieux’s father said: “It is very painful not to see a daughter any more and to have her therein in a convent, but it is a great joy to give her to God and to have her in heaven”. Parents must achieve this to become worthy of the consecrated souls, and sometimes, if necessary, they should be reprimanded to come near the truth.
Saint Romuald’s vocation began when he saw how his father killed his cousin. Frightened, he left the world, and was a privileged soul because of his mystical death while living and his life as a hermit after his Ordination. One must be a hermit after his work in the world.
In the old age, his repented father followed Romuald’s counsel and entered the congregation of the latter to save his own soul. In this sense, Romuald was unyielding: in his view, the only life of salvation was renunciation; and demonstrated it to the king Otto. Romuald took his father to the cloister, but when the former had to leave, the latter began his escapades; finally, he said he was tired and wished to come back home. Then Romuald arrived and tried to change his mind; his father stood firm, but had to be whipped, and finally said: “You are right” and stayed at the cloister.
Of course, this is not a recommendable method, but sometimes coercion becomes necessary: to remove vanities and think of our eternal salvation. Between fifty and sixty years of age, it is proper to begin a backward survey of our life, because God can take us at any instant.
To be ordained is not to let things go and laisser faire. Often false vocations fail because of the idea that to be ordained is not to worry and be lazy. A being that renounced can duplicate the work of a worldly person because of his great uncommon endurance and strength. In Community you cannot make use of worldly calculations. Ordination has a spontaneous and natural product emanated from God and the Providence. The souls must necessarily know this: “I am dead to the world, but my responsibilities are greater because I must take part in the works; I have to demonstrate that, if I follow the way to Renunciation, I can acquire greater goods, to make greater works, and to get much higher endurance; I will be able to be a power in every area but without taking part directly in this power and renouncing to harvest the fruit of this work”.
From their beginning in the Seminary, the Sons must learn that they are not exempt of being responsible for their performance by virtue of their mystical death. Every one has a holy obligation to the world, and must say: “My mystical death does not exempt me of my obligation of being useful to my Community, to my work and action and, naturally, to society”.
We must keep in mind several important questions. Everybody says: “Whoever renounces cannot be helpful because is not interested in life and satisfied for his works”. Needless to say this is untrue. Detached life and union with God give higher strength; the same work takes half time by virtue of divine action, and gives such ability that you make things that apparently are impossible. Therefore, you should say to the world: “My interest is not centered on passing and impermanent things because life is fantasy. My interest is divine because I do not wish reward for now and for my old age; my reward is to see happy souls. My joy is to see that my work is somewhat helpful for others; my interest is double”. Perchance may one say a mother is not interested in her children? She expects nothing from them, but her interest is her spontaneous love that is true and real.
The interest of an Ordained Son increases and becomes stronger. Far from the world, he can realize much because he teaches men how by living for God they can humanly produce even more. He renounced to earnings and retirement pensions, but earns more for all: for Community, to live modestly and to help others. He prepares a fertile land for life of tomorrow. Spiritual Life does reduce but bears interest!
“Spiritual life of Community atrophies your will, and your productivity is absent because you have spiritual bliss.” Not only worldly people say this, but also many good Sons living on the vale. “They are thinking just of the observance, and forget everything and do not do things properly.” We may reply: When you are observant, the value of work and other things does not diminish. A Son may forget because neglects the observance; otherwise the latter grants more spirit of attention; whoever is unobservant does not fulfill his duty. When you fulfill faithfully your duties and your observant thoughts are on God and not on trivialities, because you can be looking down but you see everything that you have to see! You fulfill the timetable of Community and at the same time you fulfill properly your personal duties. Here is the true miracle in Community: routine, observance and patience. How great is the work that you leave because the bell rings!; otherwise, your work is without perfection and spirit of renunciation. A Son does not live a dimensional time, but an expansive time: time does not count for the Sons.
By means of a methodical and routine work, doing a little every day, the Sons can make works that require teams of men in the world, because their productive power is higher and God strengthened their muscles and increased their ability to perform His orders.
It is like in Father Pio’s case, who from a distant convent, by praying constantly –he cannot do otherwise because Christ’s wounds are on his hands– was able to erect a wonderful hospital. Here is the miracle of absolute detachment and generosity.
Observance never can impede a proper realization of things. That is why the Sons of the Seminary pay extreme attention. You should actually demonstrate that observance is power.
Through His Divine Incarnation, God has instructed to consecrated souls not to assume responsibilities with the world, but to preach and lead souls. Here is their main duty!