Letter from the District Superior
Fr. John Fullerton
District Superior, USA
Letter from the District Superior
Dear Reader,
In common language, we speak of different aspects of a person’s life: his physical life, social life, intellectual life and so on. Each of them is considered to be extremely precious, as each of them enhances the whole of one’s life in general. At the same time, we recognize that they are all destined to end when we leave this world. Thus, as important as they are in their own right, their inherent limitations render our natural life inadequate and incomplete.
This is why our heavenly Father has given us a share of a higher life, His own life. He communicates to our souls supernatural grace which enables us to participate in the limitless life of God. This participation is what Catholics refer to as the “spiritual life,” the living of the life of grace.
The spiritual life is the only life that is worth living. All other lives perish; that life alone lasts forever. Because of our fallen nature, we are inclined toward a life of sin. But such a “life” is really a dying life; it was by one man’s sin that death entered this world (Rom. 5:12) and the sins of our own life bring forth death (James 1:15).
When we live the life of grace, we live unto God, Who is Life (Jn. 14:6). God’s own life springs up within us unto life everlasting. God created us and gave us life, but He wills to continue vivifying us, in such a way that we will live forever. It is striking how often Scripture speaks of God as a “life giver” to those who already have life.
Our Traditional Mass tells us, at the foot of the altar, that God will make us alive: Deus, tu convérsus vivificábis nos, “Thou wilt turn, O God, and bring us to life” (Ps. 84:7). In the Nicene Creed, we speak of the Holy Ghost as “Lord and Giver of Life,” Dóminum et vivificántem. The longest of the psalms, number 118, says to God over and over: “Make me alive!”
Our own life is insufficient. That is why God wishes to communicate to us His own life—so that we may live! The spiritual life is the truest life; all other lives are a passing shadow, a vapor, as St. James says (4:14).
We cannot help but notice that even physical life abounds where the spiritual life is flourishing. Those who live the spiritual life seek to cooperate with God in all of their actions; they want to do as many things as possible under the influence of grace. Since God is guiding them, and God is Life Itself, they become instruments for the bringing forth of life. Surely one of the signs of spiritual fruits in our chapels is the abundance of life, especially youthful life, that is found in them.
I hope that this issue of The Angelus will assist our readers to grow in the spiritual life, both so that they can live forever in Heaven and be instruments of life on this earth.
“I am come that they may have life, and have it more abundantly” (Jn. 10:10).