The Divine Perfection in Loving our Fellow Man onto Martyrdom

We have been inspired to know the importance of loving our fellow man, especially those most difficult to like and the people we would normally avoid. Yet, our dear Lord wants far more from those who desire to love Him as His Mother does…with His own Love. Father Gabriel in “Divine Intimacy” teaches us this reality. Very shortly before His death for us, our Lord taught His friends a New Commandment: “As I have Loved you, so you also must Love one another.” The Lord raised the precept from the height of human love to the supernatural or Divine level of Charity or Agape Love. No longer must we love our fellow man as we love ourselves, but now we must love all as He Loves them.

Father Gabriel states: “This perfection was so dear to Him that He called it “His Commandment”…With a master stroke, Jesus made us pass from one standard of charity to the other, from the high..but still too human one based on our love of self…to the Divine standard based on God’s Infinite Love for us….(based) on the heart of Christ, the heart of God, to penetrate the secret of His Infinite Love for us that we might emulate It. Our fraternal charity will not be perfect until it becomes….the continuation of the Love of Jesus for each of us His creatures….And Jesus loves us so much that He has given His life for us and renews this immolation each day on the Altar.”

St. Therese of Lisieux understood this Love: “O how dearly do I cherish It, since it proves to me that it is Thy Will, O Lord, to Love in me all those You bid me to Love.” She knew how difficult this was to do, but she also knew God would not and could not give such a Commandment to us, if He also did not provide the means to actually accomplish it! Father Gabriel explains that by allowing God to live again in and through us by turning our will completely over to Him with all our strength that our “love for our neighbor will truly become a renewal of the Love of Jesus.” We too must also be willing to give up our lives (our wills) so that we begin to desire, to think, to speak and to act as Jesus did while on earth, which was solely for the Glory of the Father and the salvation of souls, which is known as a “white martyrdom”. Further, we must be willing to give up our very life blood to the last drop, which is known as a “red martyrdom”. Either way, we are imitating Jesus and His Divine Charity….by and though His Divine Condescension, where God allows the reality of us living with His Will…living as He did on earth.

Blessed Dina Belanger was given to understand and imitate His Divine Charity: “If I left everything in the care of Jesus, what would happen? Jesus, in return, undertook to do everything: to think, speak, act, etc., not only with me but in my place. He substituted Himself for me and I let Him have His way. Oh! What a choice gift it is to understand how to let the Savior live within one’s self! I wish I could obtain this Grace for every soul: the earth would be a valley no longer of bitter tears, but of tears of Joy!”

Elizabeth Kindelmann also was given this Grace. Our Lord explains to her: “I beg you in the future, do not think about yourself. May your thinking be only us! If you come to Me…think that the two of us are one. Let there be no gap between us. I will fill with Grace the empty parts of your soul, and you deny yourself, so that although you keep living, it will be I who live within you and you live only through Me…From now on, no longer speak of yourself. The “I” in you must cease completely. Let there be only Me for you. That is your real life.”

God is now inundating us with this same Grace, which seeks to allow us to have this same reality! We must simply desire it, trust and give all…so that we Love with the same Love of God….with Divine Charity! Are we willing to finally trust God…who only wants our happiness now and for all eternity by giving up our will? If so, He will honor His promise…”It is no longer I who lives; It is Christ who lives in Me.” With practice and Grace, more practice and more Grace, we will begin to feel Christ living in us and begin to see Him in all our fellow bothers and sisters. Our Lord has promised a special dwelling in Heaven for those who love with Divine Charity. Let us live together in this same Mansion! We have the Divine Antidote to satan and sin! Let us not be lazy…let us not be indifferent to such Grace…indifferent to such Agape Love!