25 — APOSTOLIC ACTION

Presence of God. — I place myself in the presence of Jesus to learn from Him, the first and only Apostle, what qualities my action must have so that it may truly benefit souls.

Meditation

1 — In the three years of His public life, Jesus exercised external apostolate on a broad scale, but His activity was never separated from His intimate union with the Father; rather, it blossomed from it: a union not limited to hours of prayer alone, but a permanent, indissoluble union of every instant of His life. If such a substantial union with God can exist only in Christ by reason of the hypostatic union and of the beatific vision He enjoyed, we must nevertheless, as far as possible for mere creatures, strive to imitate this attitude of Jesus: to live continually united to God, even while working for our brothers and sisters. In this sense, the interior life is the soul of apostolate; an action truly effective, and therefore bearer of grace to souls, can proceed only from one who lives intimately united to God. Jesus Himself proclaimed it: “As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it remains in the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me” (Jn. 15, 4). Union with God, union with Jesus, is the preliminary and indispensable condition for the effectiveness of any apostolic activity. This union is effected by sanctifying grace, grows through fervent use of the sacraments, through generous practice of the virtues, is established more directly and strengthened in prayer, and is consolidated and preserved through recollection and detachment. The more union with God increases, the more the action that springs from it will bear fruit for souls. A purely external apostolic activity—that is, one that would claim, even because of the urgency of works, to neglect the exercises of interior life, prayer, and the search for union with God—would condemn itself to remain, of itself, fruitless.

2 — Jesus’ apostolic work, wholly permeated with sacrifice, culminated in the supreme Sacrifice of the Cross; so our apostolic activity, to be fruitful, must sink its roots into the fertile ground of immolation. By itself apostolic action requires sacrifice, both because of the toilsome life it imposes, and because of continual contact with persons of different mentalities, tastes, and habits, and because it may expose one to ridicule, failures, etc. The apostle must face all this with a generous heart, convinced that precisely from sacrifice, embraced in union with Jesus crucified, will spring the fecundating strength of his works. Moreover, external apostolate, to be truly supernatural, requires purity of intention: that is, works must be done only for the glory of God, in a manner conforming to God’s will, in dependence on the superiors of one’s Institute and on the ecclesiastical hierarchy. To attain such purity of intention, the apostle must, day by day, die to self-love, vainglory, the tendency to attract others’ praise or to take complacency in successes, to personal views and initiatives, to personal interests. Therefore it is a matter of true immolation of the self, which will bear apostolic fruit in proportion to its depth. “Unless the grain of wheat, fallen into the earth, dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (Jn. 12, 24-25).

Colloquy

O Jesus, make me understand well that the finest apostolic works are vain agitation if they do not derive from a deep interior life. You alone are the true vine in which the divine sap of grace circulates, and only the branch grafted into You can communicate this sap to souls, producing for them fruits of grace. What an illusion mine is if, letting myself be seized by the urgency of works, I throw myself into them while neglecting to nourish and strengthen my union with You! Yet You do not cease to call me back with the gentle warning You have deeply impressed upon my soul: “without me you can do nothing... [only] he who remains in me bears abundant fruit.” O vain agitation, O useless movement of so many works of mine undertaken as purely human activities, as though their fruit depended only on my industry and ability! O my God, preserve me from such folly; no, I do not want to squander my energies this way, to waste my time this way. It was not worthwhile for me to consecrate myself to You, to dedicate myself to an apostolic life, only to reduce myself then to a purely human activity, such as can be carried out by any professional or worker. Even those who do not believe in You devote themselves to social works: they open schools, hospitals, print books and newspapers, do propaganda: what must distinguish my activity from theirs must be precisely the interior spirit from which it comes: spirit of union with You, spirit of prayer, of sacrifice. Only this has the great power to transform poor human action into supernatural action, into apostolate. Grant, O Lord, that my action may flow from the vigorous branch strongly grafted into You, grant that it may be steeped in prayer, permeated with sacrifice.

Make me understand, O my Jesus, how necessary it is for me to die to myself in order to reach that total purity of intention that must animate every true apostolate! How many times I believe I am moved by zeal for Your glory and for the good of souls, and perhaps, on the contrary, I am moved, at least in large part, by my pride, which wants to accomplish those works because in them it finds an outlet for its natural tendency to activity, its hidden craving to be seen, to make itself count, the desire for applause, for success. And is it not precisely for such motives that I often resist obedience, the desires and even the express wills of my superiors, deeming myself misunderstood by them and therefore authorized to follow my own opinion, in preference to theirs?

O Lord, all these possible deviations of my self, seen thus in Your light, how ugly, petty, detestable, and deeply unworthy they seem to me of a soul consecrated to You! But even if they awaken in me a sense of horror, I do not ask You, my God, to lessen Your light; rather I beg You to make it ever more penetrating, so that I may see clearly in my soul and, with the help of Your almighty grace, fight vigorously against these low tendencies of self, which, like gnawing moths, threaten to ruin and destroy my apostolate.

Give me purity of intention, give me humility of heart, give me truth of love! Draw me to You, my God, and I will seek only You!