Church of Jesus Christ of the Universe

By Mauro

1 November 2022

Solemnity of All Saints

Rev 7:2-4, 9-14; Ps 24; 1Jn 3:1-3; Mt 5, 1-12

(Translated audio)

The Solemnity we celebrate today, All Saints’ Day, is directly linked to tomorrow’s feast[1] as the two form a unity. I think that we often celebrate today’s Feast with joy, but tomorrow’s with a kind of sadness, while these two Feasts form a unity and transmit something to us. They clearly show us the difference in the response to God; however, those we celebrate today and those we remember tomorrow are all children of God. Finally, St. John says in the reading: “Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known” (1 Jn 3:2). Today’s Saints reveal this a little bit to us.

Today we celebrate those who let themselves be completely transformed by grace, by the mind of Christ, by Love. They have let themselves be transformed into new human beings by the situations of life through their unreserved “yes” to God. Tomorrow we remember and pray together with those who also have the desire to become new people but still have set certain limits to the action of grace. Yet, but even in purgatory, where they are now, the transformation of their mind continues until they are new beings; however, like us (I count myself among them) those in purgatory and the Saints of today, are all holy, since they are children of Him who is Holy.[2]

All of us, the Saints of today and those we celebrate tomorrow, want to participate in the banquet of the Lamb.[3] We want to follow Him all the way through and let Him work unhindered. However, I repeat that through these two Feasts (and I hope I can explain it) the difference in their response to God becomes clear. On the one hand, there are those who have a strong mind, or ego, who cannot be transformed, who cling to many things and have many personal limits that they offer to God; on the other hand, there are the Saints we celebrate today.

We have often said that holiness is a work of God[4] in a soul that says “yes” to Him. That “yes” must be continuously repeated in all concrete actions of life, in the intervention of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and of all His instruments.[5] Holiness means abandoning oneself totally to God, and we have always tried to do that by offering ourselves to Him through Mary and through our desire to die to ourselves. This is where the whole transformation takes place. Therefore, it is not something that happens suddenly, it is not a grace that is given for free, but comes through the continuous response we give in our life.

Today’s first reading of Revelation speaks to us in a special way: it speaks of a sign given to all children[6], and we can say it is our sign.[7] The entire Church of the universe carries it. The reading also speaks of a specific number, the exact number of the children of Israel, 144,000, and then there is a great uncountable multitude of those who have come out of the great tribulation and washed themselves in the blood of the Lamb. This great tribulation is life. This great tribulation is the path that each of us here on Earth has chosen. I am talking about the Earth, I dare not talk about how it might be on other planets. We have to face a path in which our decision at the time of conception, our “yes” to God, has already played a major role. In addition, there are situations in life, such as mistakes for which we have to bear the consequences, but our whole life, becomes an instrument of holiness and transformation. Through a complete “yes” to God. Here I return to what I have already said: the less resistance we offer to this transformation, the sooner we enter the New Creation as holy people.

Therefore, if we go through life and everything that happens to us with faith, that makes us holy. St. John expresses it clearly at the end of the first letter we read today: “We shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.”[8] He speaks about the hope and faith that we are with Him, that we are as He is, knowing that thanks to Him and His redemption we are children of God. We want to have hope in the situations of life by which we are purified, transformed and made holy.

If you look closely, this level of transformation, purification, holiness and elevation cannot be reached on Earth without doing the passage of the Cross. Our faith, our hope and our love must be tested by the truly hard situations of life. We all know the Easter passage from the readings; we know that we must die and rise again, but all this must be truly lived. It is not enough to talk about it theoretically.  We have to go through this passage in concrete way. There, our faith, hope and love are put to the test, as St. John said; the person who lives in this way is sanctified.

Remember Job. When did he come to the awareness of saying, “I know that my redeemer lives” (Job 19,25)?  When he had lost everything. When will we be able to say, “I know my Redeemer lives,” with this faith? When we experience trials! It is much easier to say it in quiet, blissful times. The passage of the Cross is obligatory, and it is a grace.

If I want to make a distinction between today’s Saints and those of tomorrow, the difference is this: today’s Saints allowed God to act freely in them. Like Job, they said, “I know that my redeemer lives.”  Tomorrow’s saints, like us, offered a little resistance against the difficulties, asking, “Why? Why me? Why this?” We keep praying that nothing may happen to us and that we are always fine.

Today’s readings, beginning from the Revelation, which was also handed down by the Holy Apostle John, and the Gospel about the Beatitudes, everything openly points to this. The Beatitudes say it clearly! When are we blessed? When we do not find peace, when we do not experience justice. Bliss comes when we are afflicted, meek, merciful, persecuted, insulted and mistreated. All that expresses exactly what we are talking about. We are blessed when we die to ourselves, when we let our ego die, when we let go of our ideas of justice and our reasons, believing that He has more sublime ones. We are blessed when we are poor before God. We do not even expect to know what is right, we just know that God knows – we are poor before God. Then we are blessed, we live through our transformation and become holy.

Holiness, is the transformation of our whole being: spirit, soul and body. Everything must die. The spirit is eternal, it does not die, but it must expand. God lives in the spirit, who must take possession of the soul, and therefore the thoughts of the soul must die. The memory, the mind and the will of the soul[9] must awaken in God, not in what the soul brings out itself. And finally, the body must also die, for it must also rise again new and glorified. Everything is a passage through death and resurrection. It is the work of grace; it is the work of God, as we have said, but God has given us instruments to support His work in us. Holiness is also the result of communion.

We can support this path if we recognise God’s permanent action with our intelligence and our ability to discern. The Gospel mentions it several times, and Jesus prays for humanity to know what is best for it and through whom. Referring to Jerusalem, Jesus says with great sadness: “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace” (Luke 19,41-44). We too must recognise through whom the best thing happens to us. We must recognise what God is doing now so that we may participate in this work of transformation. Today’s Saints participated in the work of God, which was specific for their time. Each Saint was integrated into the dynamics of that specific time.

I will take some examples: Don Bosco took care of children and young people at his time. This is always necessary, but at that time, he cared for those who were abandoned and alone. At the time of Padre Pio, it was necessary to pray. There were wars, the Confederation of the Light was being formed and prayer groups were necessary. Padre Pio created a lot of of them. Mother Teresa had the desire to embrace the weakest of society. She also expanded her work because in India, where she worked, most of the people were Muslims, Hindus and very few were Christians.

Therefore, we have to recognise what God is doing in our time. How is He using the Foundation?[10] How is He using the extraordinary instruments? How are they cooperating with God? What is He asking from us in this time? Therefore, understanding and accepting the action of God in what opens up before us leads us to be holy, because holy people cooperate with grace. Everything is God’s work, but we must participate in it.

As St. John says, with this faith and hope in Him, “in whom we purify ourselves,” we give the Lord the chance to bring everything to completion. Only through our faith will He succeed in bringing everything to completion, for He always works in the fullness of time. He brings everything He does to completion. He takes the individual to fullness because of his or her “yes” to God, that is, to the highest degree of holiness, which is different for each one of us. In our uniqueness, every one of us reaches the highest level. Yet, God will also bring His work of co-redemption, elevation and reunification of all things in Christ to completion, which is what is happening now, and we must let Him work and cooperate with Him.

So let us thank God; let us thank all the Saints who cooperate with God, those we know and those we do not know; even those we will meet later in time. Already today, let us pray with all the Saints for the souls of tomorrow that they may quickly begin to transform their way of thinking so that the number of those who help us on Earth may increase. May they let go of their burdens and problems to enter directly into Heaven. I believe that the Feasts of today and tomorrow, forming unitedly one day, are part of our mission. We have been entrusted with a Portal[11] through which everyone will pass. Try to think about it today and tomorrow. I know you are already doing it, but do it today in order to do it more and more often: baptise, bless, visit our amphitheatre in your mind[12] and walk the path marked out there. That means working with the Saints and the souls in purgatory. We, too, here on Earth, are a bit like the souls in purgatory. We are only halfway there. Let us try to shape ourselves more and more.

May God bless us in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

[1] On 2 November, the feast of All Souls is celebrated.

[2] See Lv 19.3

[3] See Rev 19,9

[4] See also the article of 29 October 2022, “Preparation for the Solemnity of All Saints” published on our website https://towardsthenewcreation.com/

[5] The instruments of God for this time are explained in the section “The Extraordinary Instruments of God” on our website

[6] See Rev 7,2-4

[7] For more about the sign, see the section “The Sign is a Cross …” on our website

[8] See 1 Jn 3:2-3; the original Italian quotation, “sanctify themselves” corresponds to “purify themselves” in the Bible version NIV

[9] The three faculties of the soul, memory, intelligence and will, are explained in the book of Stefania Caterina, “Beyond the Great Barrier”, Chap. 13, “The Microcosm”; Luci dell’Esodo, https://www.lucidellesodo.it/en/

[10] Foundation “Fortress of the Immaculate”; Fondazione “Fortezza dell’Immacolata”

[11] It is the portal in the House-Sanctuary of the Face of Mary in Medjugorje. For more details, see the article  “The Three Great Portals of the Earth in the Church of Jesus Christ of the Universe”, published in the book “Towards the New Creation-Vol. VI- 2018-2019”, and on our website, 4 October 2019

[12] The amphitheatre is located in the House-Sanctuary of the Face of Mary in Medjugorje