Accept Yourself cont'd

Why is healing so important to discernment? Ultimately, it is about you getting to where you need/want to go; healing is not for the sake of discovery, though essential to it, healing is about being able to LIVE. Vocation is giving your LIFE as a gift. Generally, when giving a gift you know what's inside the box, and so it is with yourself. If you are going to be a gift, you need to know what you are giving. Careful! This doesn't mean a complete self-knowledge. It means, first of all, to know that you need to be healed in order to be whole/holy, and secondly, that you can be healed and made holy. Without this wholeness and healing, vocation - to which discernment is ordered - is a big scam. It becomes just another heavy item on the to do list, another potential failure in the big exam of life, and the cause of much anxiety.  Key to the wholeness and healing part is recognizing that YOU are not the healer, God is the Healer.

Recently, I heard this truth eloquently stated in these words:

Important as it is to correct them (our wounds) by natural means, it would be a serious error for anyone trying to live a true spiritual life to reverse the order of nature and grace by becoming utterly preoccupied with efforts to heal these wounds rather than learning to live in Christ, in whom alone these wounds can be completely healed.   (Rev. Joseph Koterski, S.J Ph.D)

In other words, we are wounded because while saved by Christ the damage of original sin still lingers.  We often find ourselves utterly stupefied by our obstinant persistance in sin, failures, and imperfections. We try to do battle against them, often by our own natural power, thinking them to be too big for God to heal, or perhaps too little for them to matter to Him. But, we must stop trying to go against grace - which perfects our nature - and rather allow it to work in our lives. This grace is nothing short of the life of God in us, healing us, and bringing us to fulfillment/wholeness/holiness - the living out of our vocation.

St. Maximilian Kolbe was no foreigner to human frailty; he was nervous, sick, idealistic, and stubborn. Undoubetedly, this is a recipe for discontent in a lesser soul. Yet, he was a man a peace. His main secret: the Immaculata. St. Max wrote: "The Immaculata is good and, indeed so good that despite so many frailties, she is not discouraged with us."  And so, St. Maximilian's advice?

"Try to run to Mary as a little child to its best, beloved mother, if only by invoking the holy name of Mary with your lips or heart in the difficulties of life, in the darkness and weakness of soul. You will be convinced of what Mary is able to do and you will come to know Her Son," the Divine Physician.

The challenge then, is to really take a good look at yourself. Because, if none of this sounds familiar to you, I'm afraid you aren't listening...or you aren't looking. If you are looking, the challenge is to accept St. Maximilian's invitation and not lose courage - but turn toward the Immaculata and go forward in Christ.