Church of Jesus Christ of the Universe

Edited by Mauro

3.7.2024

Holy Mass of healing

Eph 2: 19-22; Ps 116; Jn 20: 24-29

In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

May the grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. (And with your spirit).

We thought, today, on this feast day – for us it is a feast day, it is a feast day for Father Tomislav, but it is a feast day because St Thomas has been given to us as a patron saint. He is always close to us. He is, together with St Raphael, with all our saints and with our other patron saints, one who intercedes for us, who prays, who gives us graces – and we have decided just today to begin a work that is part of our mandate: free the prisoners, cast out demons, announce that the Kingdom of God is near, that the Lord is near¹. And this drives away all fear. Fear drives away hope, fear drives away God, not that God moves away, we move away out of fear.

We, on the contrary, are asked and are given the mandate, I repeat to bring peace, love to the whole universe. But, if we want to sum it up, I would say: take to the whole universe that there is a Father, that you are children. And when that word “Father” flows within us, I guarantee you, all fears will flee. When the knowledge that we have a Father takes possession of our whole being we will have won.

So, in order to celebrate a Mass of healing from our fears, the first thing is: let us seek to enter into this contact with the Father. Then, He will heal us through the Son. But it all starts with the Father.

May the simplicity of Your love, of Your life, O Father, conquer our whole being, all our souls, each one of us. May Your love bring down all those images that have led us to fear You. May all those words that have wounded Your figure, that have presented as a judging Father, fall from our souls; may our souls also heal from the wound we have received from the human father.

O Father, we want to pray for healing from fear. The greatest fear is fear of You. It seems impossible to be afraid of Love, and yet it is so. So, today, through the intercession of the whole Church, of St Thomas and Mary Most Holy, may Your love descend upon this humanity, in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

***

I am glad to celebrate this Mass of healing from our fears on St Thomas’ day. Not only because he is with us and will be praying with us, but also because this attitude of Thomas (“Unless I put my hand into his side, I refuse to believe…”²) is a typical attitude of fear. Fear that does not have the courage to believe because he feels guilty of having betrayed the Lord, of not having been under the Cross; and measures the love of God, of Jesus, by the actions he has done. Then a justification starts within the soul, a destructive mechanism starts that leads one not to believe. However, he made a passage: “My Lord and my God.”³

So, if we want to look at healing from fears today, the first step is to be honest and look at our fears: what am I afraid of? We cannot send away everything that blocks us, makes us afraid, everything that holds us back by justifying it with more or less right attitudes.

See what Jesus did with Thomas, He will do with each one of us. He did not make a magic prayer: He appeared and Thomas had a request: “Unless I can put my finger into the holes…” Jesus said, “Put it!” Very concrete. And as He made him make that gesture, I would say that Thomas rejoiced in the Holy Spirit: “My Lord and my God”. And so, for each of us: let us look at our own fear today and go through it with Jesus. This is the premise.

Fear is the most powerful weapon of evil. It is the opposite of faith; it is the opposite of hope. We all know that through fear, especially of death, Lucifer keeps us enslaved⁴. Already saying this sentence is the confirmation of everything I said before: if we are slaves, we are not free and we cannot exult “My Lord and my God” in the fullness of the Holy Spirit.

Fear is directly related to original sin, it starts there. If we look, Adam and Eve conversed freely with God. God came down in the evening to have a chat with Adam and Eve; I think with many other couples who were there, right? God would come down, they would chat. Because of that passage that I am not going to describe – original sin⁵ – God comes down again: “Where are you?”, “I have hidden myself. I am afraid. I was afraid.”⁶ And it all starts there: the fear of God. Until the day before we talk to Him and then we are afraid.

Look, from that moment – and we are in original sin! I know we said yes to God at conception, we were foreseen for the new creation, but here on earth we are in original sin. Let no one think: “I am not touched.” Mary Most Holy was foreseen without original sin to conceive Jesus, but everyone else… – from that moment, from that sin, the soul began to run away from God. It began to hide, and from that running away all states of mind are born. It is from that running away from God that all sin was born, all error. It is from that moment that our thinking, the thinking of the soul, which is detached from God, is born. And it is from that moment that we begin a path to re-enter the thinking of God.

However, our soul has formed its own thought. It was shocked and frightened. Try to imagine what it must have been like for the soul to pass from conversing with God to being afraid of Him. That is a shock! Isn’t it? It is from there that all the dimensions in the soul have their origin that we now struggle to immerse into the Spirit. For this reason alone you can understand that it is right to celebrate a healing Mass for fears. We should not feel wrong because we are afraid, it is normal. This normality, if we acknowledge it, will open a passage for so many souls, for all of Purgatory, because even those souls are afraid. They are still in Purgatory because they are afraid. We know that Our Lady descends in Purgatory only on the great feasts because the souls are afraid. So, bringing them this announcement: “It is normal to be afraid, but we have a Saviour with the Father”, is the first step to free them. They relax, they rest, and they are ready to let themselves be healed. Let us do the same for our soul. It is normal.

If we do not make this step of saying “It is normal, calm down, my soul, rest, be good!”, an infinite number of escape routes immediately start in our soul. We begin to seek justification, and we enter into that dynamic, which is also of all men: we seek God, but we fear Him. It is a continuous “I seek Him, I want Him, but I am not able to abandon myself completely to Him.”

From that fear we could list a very large book of many fears that all start from there. I will only list a few: fear of making mistakes, fear of judgement, of God’s judgement and the judgement of others, fear of everything new – everything new frightens us; fear of not being understood. How many times do I too say, “Have I explained myself? Have you understood?” It is fear. Then: fear of others, fear of the dark, fear of the light. We are afraid of everything. Not everyone, but there are those who are afraid of the dark, those who lock themselves in a room because they are afraid of the light. There are all kinds of fears.

Why does this happen? Because if we do not get out of this dynamic of original sin, asking God for help, we will be driven by fear. In every way it is fear who guides us. It is that way by which evil keeps us enslaved. Because even the fear of death means having a weak faith. But it is always that fear of the unknown: what is it going to be? Fear of novelty, because nobody knows what it is like. Then there are normal fears, of course: fear of pain is normal, fear of a lion is normal. That is, I am not saying that all fears are wrong. So, if we are driven by fear, we see securities as the only way out, because those make us feel at peace. But, if we look, those very securities are the ones that prevent us from really healing.

And, in fact, Jesus in the Gospel, which is all about healing from fear – “Do not be afraid” is the most frequent word in the Gospel –, throughout that journey Jesus makes us leave all securities behind, because they prevent us from healing, they prevent us from hearing the Father again.

I think each of us sees these attitudes, and it is clear to each of us that these attitudes are far from faith. It is clear that these attitudes clash with that love we have for God, with that certainty that He loves us, that we are precious to Him; they clash with that certainty that He holds us in His hand and nothing will happen to us that will harm us. We know that they clash, but we must be honest, as I said at the beginning: some fear still stirs within us. And that is why we want to celebrate this Mass, we want to do it as witnesses of humanity. However, to truly be instruments we must live this healing relationship with Jesus for the benefit of others, but we must be victim, altar and priest, if you agree.

So, make yourselves comfortable and take a step in faith: “Jesus wants to heal me. God the Father sent His Son and through Him He wants to heal me”. This attitude alone should make you smile, it should open you up to joy: “God the Father wants to heal me”.

So, through my voice hear how Jesus wants to speak to you: “Do you feel child?”

Answer Him, as when He asked Peter: “Do you love me?”

“Do you trust me? Do you have faith in my work? Are you aware that you are a creature? Are you aware that I love you as you are? Are you aware that without me you cannot conquer fear? Does it give you peace to know that you are a creature in need of my help, or does it frighten you? Does it give you peace to know that it is up to me to heal your soul, up to me to immerse it in the Holy Spirit, up to me to make you a child and return you to your dignity as a child of God?

Does this give you peace or would you rather do it on your own? Does this abandonment scare you? If it frightens you, say so. Does it frighten you not to be able to do anything except welcome my love?

If you are not afraid, step forward, let me work freely. Hold nothing in your mind, in your heart. Let go of every burden, let go of your thoughts, even the most beautiful ones. Let go of all your prayers. Let go of all your needs.

Let go of all your duties, your loved ones, your problems. Let go of the world. Let go of every tension.

Do not be afraid, let me work freely! Do not try to hide your innermost feelings from me: I gave them to you. Even what you think is not right, I gave it to you. Let go of your deepest desires, give them free rein, I gave them to you.

And those memories you hold so dear, to which you sometimes resort, let them go. Allow me to make everything new. The Father has given me the power to recreate. I can make your soul, your body and your thoughts new.

Pass with me through everything that still surfaces as a memory, as a sorrow. And you too, like St Thomas, say: “My Lord and my God”.

Say with me to everything that still frightens you: the future, death, illness: “My Lord and my God”.

I have decided to rewrite history with you. I have decided to form a new people with you, a people that does not fear God, a people that lets itself be loved and that wants to love. Let me work freely!”

Let us sing (“Niente ti turbi”⁷ – Nothing worries you, nothing frightens you. God alone is enough. God is faithful love.)

It is always Jesus who tells us: “I have healed you, now it is your turn. See to it that nothing worse happens to you. If you still return to fear, if you still return to look for justification, to stop facing novelty, to be afraid of the future that I have prepared for you, then fear will once again take possession of your life.”

So I advise you: do as the great witnesses did. Abraham, all the great saints. You are new, you are healed, you are children, leave your land, leave Jerusalem, leave everything that will make you return to fear. You see, the world as it is conceived, is conceived to create these fears, it is conceived to destroy the dimension of faith and the certainty of God “My Lord and my God”. Even the most normal things, Lucifer thought of them, wanted them, invented them to block the action of God’s children.

It is no coincidence that Jesus says: “Go forth, go, leave, let the dead bury their dead⁸, detach yourselves!”. Trust God, He will bring us to fullness, to the fullness of life. He will bring us to witness His power and glory. That is why He has healed us. If we do not get there, what good is the healing? To get sick again?

“Do not turn back. Whoever puts his hand to the plough and turns back is not worthy of me”⁹. That “He is not worthy of me” is synonymous with “He is not worthy of life. He is not worthy to live freely” because he turns back, because he is still looking elsewhere. Throw yourselves into God, participate in His work, but participate with all your strength, with your whole self. Only in this way you will receive a hundredfold, you will experience the joy of being children of God, you will experience the same joy as Jesus, “my joy, and may your joy be complete”¹⁰.

And I bless you, in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

May Your blessing, O Father, precede us in all that lies ahead of us in this life. Your blessing before us prepare all whom we are to meet, awaken all who have said yes to you at conception. May Your blessing before us drive away Lucifer and all his army.

May Your blessing also prepare creation, may everything before us and around us express Your fatherhood, express Your love. I ask you, O Father, to bless in a special way those who are called in this time to choose, to decide; may Your blessing remove all fear from them, all human reasoning and human concern; may Your paternity envelop them, may Your love make them melt into tears, into tears of joy.

May Your blessing prepare the way for your Church, prepare the way for the extraordinary and the ordinary instruments. May it prepare the way for Your children. The time has come to rejoice, the time has come to gather, the time has come to witness with all Your power. So may this power descend on all hospitals, on all the dying. May it come into Purgatory; let Your power descend upon those who are imprisoned at this time, descend upon those who are sad, upon those who are losing hope. May Your power descend also into hell and remind Lucifer, all his own, that it is over for them, in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Let us go in peace. (We give thanks to God).