EP 13 - Without Love Nothing
00:00 No, no, peace, domine, domine. No, no, peace, domine. …de domini, sem domini, …goo da domina.
00:25 …when I was about 13, 14, …my parents took me to Laban, …a market town in Yorkshire, At the head of Wensleydale, it was from here that our forebears came.
00:46 They were requisomes, and they lived in and around Laban. To this day, if you go there, you'll find still standing the Grove Hotel.
00:59 It was originally Grove House, our family lived there for many, many decades. …is extremely old and goes back to chewed at times.
01:13 Then it belonged to a certain Dr. Allen, a very famous gentleman indeed. He got his doctorate at Cambridge University, went to the continent, fled to the continent to become a priest, …and eventually he became the rector of Dauy College, …and then reams the prepared secular priest …to come into this
01:42 country, in his guise, …to bring the master the faithful, …and the vast majority of them died, …and died horrible deaths.
01:54 After visiting Laban and Grove House, …and I was delighted to see as a young man, a priest hiding the hole.
02:06 After that, we went to Hull, to visit to the infamous prison in the dungeons of the castle.
02:19 The dungeon was so dreadful that they used to throw Catholics in there who refused to go to the Protestant pseudo mass every week and receive communion, and they stayed there until they changed their mind.
02:39 It was a dreadful place. selbe? The tide came in twice a day and soaked them, but high tide he came up to here, they were sowst over and over and and over again.
02:57 They were never dry and they stayed there to rot, until they gave in. And went to the Protestant service in their local church.
03:13 Where did they get the strength from? How did they do it? What were the resources that they called upon? Well, I want to tell you what they are and how they received them in this talk.
03:32 But first of all, let me say, it was during this, these experiences. You N Haftioi'n vwassauh. 6. 6.容gs heard. 7.
03:49 Hèmanzu, 5. Hof 7. N She' aquable 9. 😂😂😂 Oh no, but I didn't want to be any priest. I wanted to be the 가장 possible priest and in those days who were the best possible priest, you could possibly become.
04:20 They were the Jesuits. We had them every year for retreats and I think I must a 7-8 of their retreats, as I went through my school days.
04:34 And we loved the Jesuit. We loved their sort of straight from the shoulder, no nonsense, Christianity. I suppose with hindsight, I would call it humanism.
04:47 I would call it a sort of semi-pelagianism. But wow, didn't that appeal to teenage boys who thought that they could change the world as they could change themselves.
04:59 This was the sort of spirituality, the robust spirituality that we needed, but sadly, thanks to my dyslexia, I couldn't become a j asy, because I hadn't the academic qualifications that would lead them to accept me.
05:19 I only became a Franciscan because my brother had preceded me, and his qualifications were. …so impeccable … …oh, but he even asked … …if I had any … Now, in preparation for going … …I made a retreat … …and who did I go to for the retreat?
05:38 My last retreat… …I went to Reinhill in Lancashire — …which was rum then, …and I still is to my knowledge … …by the Jesuits … …and there I received my preparation … A group were divided into small groups, send away to study the gospels and find all the virtues that Christ livinged and practised.
06:15 …and when we done that, we brought the list of these virtues back, and they were written on the blackboard. Then we discussed them, discussed which were the most important.
06:26 We put them in order. And then we went away again to decide what order each of us would erortu denose друга, angina, unruferabirr unruferabirr unruferabir liarracest portant virtues, headed by what he called introduced to us as the principal virtues or the cardinal virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude
07:21 and temperance. And we all took down an unknown book that famous league table of virtues because the retreat masters said When we have mastered those, then indeed we will become saints.
07:44 And so it went to the Franciscan, the bishop, with a list of these virtues in my hand. And I was delighted when the novice master said, in this year, I want you to make yourselves to endow yourselves with the mage of virtues.
08:05 of the kykweg con escuffiel есть the vercile, winged on those.suspenseful. As I think I've told you before and so we went to it, I thought I had heads down because I got this lead table of the most important virtues kilos as I told you before all the way through with utteran exhaustion I failed to make
08:29 myself holy It was too difficult F short, exhausted by the effort of it all. I was a total failure, and I was about to leave when I had my Damascus road experience that I mentioned to you before, discovering that it's a bookpacks anime which had within it busy mortal words on the first page.
08:54 It is only with love, that you will be able to do anything just as without love. …tover, you will be able to do nothing at all.
09:05 Now, that little book had been translated from the Spanish by a certain father Dominic Divas, OEM, a very famous old Franciscan priest who had written many books and translated many works, particularly from Spanish into English.
09:28 So you can imagine my absolute delight when the novice master said, and your final retreat will be given by Father Dominic Devas.
09:40 Oh, I thought he was dead a lot years ago. Oh no, he wasn't dead. He was alive to give us the best retreat, give me the best retreat that I have ever had.
09:52 Zeh was the best retreat that I ever had, not just because of what he said, but because of who he was, and how we saw him preparing himself for each talk, at least half an hour sometimes a laur in prayer, before he ever even opened his mouth.
10:12 This is why he spoke so powerfully. constru się Iby niż Denis, widzowi Eng diga wahh Krillic Plis energisch Hans Pi engineers, Apollo o Sonsalили?
10:49 vais Joc pan, a depop A simple says remembered Chapter 13 of his letter to the Corinthians Both the greatest to them all IS LOVE with how lucky you can't possibly attain any of these virtues as you read in the Bookllenidades ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― …i hem personali, at the absolute importance of love without
11:29 love, you can do nothing at all, the virtue with which we must begin, and I hadn't even heard about it, was the theological virtue of love with love, all things are possible, without it nothing was is possible at all.
11:51 talatak제, Q.org p Administrer artist panol they would discuss matters of contemporary importance, usually moral matters and I remember a particular program I remember it so clearly they had invited an Annika Archbishop on to the panel of the subject was morality citizenship and began with the Archbishop
12:49 holding forth and he said, Do you know whether you are a Christian or whether you are not a Christian whether you are an atheist or or or agnostic, you cannot but accept the fact that in the Ghospos you find the most sublime moral teaching that the world has ever known.
13:14 Poppy Cop, rubbish, said Professor Joed, Professor of Ethics at London University. Lonsons! Have you ever read the gospel he said to the bishop?
13:28 Of course I've read the gospel. Many, many, many times over. Well, and tell me if I am miscoaching the gospel.
13:37 Listen, the gospel says this, does it not? you have got to be perfect. As God is perfect, you've got to love other people, not just as yourself, but as Jesus Christ, the Son of God loves you.
14:00 You've got to forgive people who hate you, who would put you to death, who would ― ― ― ― ― ― God to forgive them seventy times.
14:10 Seven, have you not? I tell you that is impossible for any human being. It is a morality that leads to disaster.
14:24 That's why he said, so many of you Christians end up guilt-ridden hypocrites. Btw, you can't keep up to that moral philosophie.
14:36 You fail time and time again. You give up and so you settle for being just nominal Christians. That is not a moral teaching for man.
14:48 It may be a moral teaching for angels, but we're not angels with human beings. Well, what do you say, or do you think?
15:00 Lose you right? Yes, oh yes. Oh yes, oh yes, he was right. Of course we cannot keep the moral teaching of the gospels as Jesus Christ our Lord kept the moral teaching of the gospels.
15:17 As you can see that moral teaching, those virtues embodied in him and to perfection why? Because he was possessed by love, he was possessed by the love of God, and until we are possessed in the same way by the love of God, we will not be able to imitate him, we will not be able to follow in his footsteps
15:43 , we will not be able to follow, for to follow, let alone put into practice That's supply moral teaching of the gospels.
15:55 It all depends on love, but love like everything else has to be learnt. And this is a gradual process.
16:08 And that is where we begin the spiritual life learning how to love. de SHAMARAOative. vys forever … потомуac with the whole strength.
16:53 And she taught this for her son, P02 Jesus – who practiced it lately, … not only in the morning but three times a day, in the synagogue – … they practised… … fridgebly even during the tilly times.
17:20 to love God in all that they did, all that they said and all that they did throughout every day. This is how they practiced the love of God, gently trying to love God in prayer.
17:39 And trying to love God in the neighbor, indeed, with whom he identifies himself. yþll.><i></i></i></i></i></i></i></i SPD Hi cri Quincy ó With those Christians who He had been hunting down and putting to death.
18:26 When you do it to the least of my brethren, you are doing it to me, so we're not only practicing the love of God.
18:38 When we try to put into practice our morning offering. But when we are also trying to love Christ in the neighbor in need, this is how we are first of all trying to use and practice the theological virtue of love.
19:08 But then as we have seen, we are called to go further. To deepen this love, this love is effective, or this tragically trying to love God is effective because it takes place within the mystical body of Jesus Christ.
19:30 It is into his mystical body that we have been drawn up when we were baptized. But that is just the beginning.
19:43 For this love must deepen as we come to know and love God more deeply. That is why now we learn to meditate.
19:57 Meditate on God's love as it is embodied in Jesus Christ our Lord. That's where we come to know God and come to love Him.
20:09 I'm then incoming to know and to love Him therefore. Our love for Christ is not only deepened and we are not only taken to Him but we are drawn up into Him as meditation leads us to contemplation.
20:29 Through meditation we have been able to to come to know and love Jesus Christ as He was on this earth two thousand years ago, but then as we persevere the Holi spirit leads us on then into contemplation where we are taken up not just into Christ being but into His acting, into His loving of the Father
21:01 , into His hypostatic loving. Remember the word hypostatic, the hypostatic union that exists within Christ that enables us when we are taken plutonia up into him, to pray in wit and through his human nature, through his divine nature, in such a way that we can contemplate God, and that is the calling
21:29 of all of us. This is not for a chosen few. This is the calling of all of us. This is where love finally leads us.
21:44 So this, what I knew, hybrid form of loving, when our love and Christ love become one, this hypostatic loving, if you like, came to be called contemplation.
22:03 Now it is in contemplation, according to St. Thomas Aquinas, that in contemplating we received now the fruits of contemplation from God.
22:16 The infused virtues now enter into us through the love of God, together with the gifts …and fruits of the Holy Spirit, this is where our forebears receive their strength.
22:35 …to live and die for their faith. …and so it's important we know exactly what these infuse virtues are and how we are to receive them.
22:51 We receive them through persevering in love, through daily offering the day to God, loving God in the neighbor in need, coming to know and to love God by developing meditation on Christ as He was when He was on earth, …and then to be led on by the Holy Spirit into contemplation.
23:17 Why? Because although you can love somebody who existed 2,000 years ago, and we learn to love him, …you cannot be united with him and love of its very nature once union.
23:33 …and so now the transition takes place as the Holy Spirit leads us on. Beyond meditation, through meditation, into contemplation, where we come to contemplate Christ as He is now.
23:50 Not just to contemplate Him, but to be taken up into Him, so that in with and through Him we begin to contemplate the Father, from whom now we receive the infused virtues.
24:09 ,and the gifts and fruits of the oldest bit. Let me explain what I'm trying to say. In the middle of the 17th century, Sir Isaac Newton was born.
24:30 And Sir Isaac Newton, among many other things, discovered this. Actual He haurit that sheathed within a single shaft of light … are all the colors of the spectrum.
24:49 We don't see them, they are invisible … But when they strike a prism, they are refracted and reflected in such a way that you la il Score K God.
25:30 By plunging ourselves into whatever deepening prayer life that leads us on into contemplation. Now, as we begin to receive God's love in the Christ, then that love enters into us, a heart become as it were, the prisms that enable that love to be refracted in to be disseminated into every part of our
26:04 spiritual metabolism. So that when we begin to exercise The muscles of our soul, the muscles of our spiritual being, therefore, they are infused by the Holy Spirit in such a way that they develop into the infused virtues.
26:33 The same virtues that I'd written down before, but now infused by the Holy Spirit, they Thier Couldn't Be Optane, Right now they are almost automatically obtained Without you even thinking about it.
27:09 Whether you, in Christ and to contemplate God, then from him you receive the fruits of contemplation. Be it fused virtues, be gifts, the fruits of the Holy Spirit, and this is the stuff that makes saints, this is the only way to perfection.
27:30 That's why I've always in the first part of this ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― Әрііі Friends, on goaafdramatic.
27:42 ? Dagantan paratana 온 өтепетж и decma mor ع gluedatana dhinantana V here through contemplative prayer, that we receive, therefore, the infused virtues.
27:59 Then there is nothing that is impossible to us. However, I want to introduce to you a very important virtue that we begin by practicing for ourselves, and it is called completely gone from my head now, it is called practice makes perfect.
28:42 And as we practice and persevere, there's the word that was alluding me, Perseverance, yes, we begin by practicing this virtue for ourselves, but without it, we would never pass our examinations, never become professionals, never learn a trade, never learn a language, never learn a musical instrument
29:13 , without perseverance, perseverance, perseverance, perseverance. And that is a normal human virtue. That can lead us on into prayer, into meditation, into contemplation.
29:34 We will automatically be led there by the Holy Spirit if we only persevere ,and keep persevering in prayer.
29:48 In good times, in bad times. Whether it's raining or snowing, or whether the sun is shining, persevering, persevering, persevering. That is the most important virtue.
30:06 It's a sort of a crossover virtue which leads us on 300x4 40%, 300x4 Nazismos 52%. 20 Nazismos ― ― ― ― ― D'un momento emt wased to be a great athlete because I was mad on sport.
30:49 Not any form of athlete, I wanted to be a decafatalit. I wanted to go to the next Olympic Games and perform ten differen forms of the discus, the javelin, sprinting, high jump, pole vault.
31:06 denly kluta?53 % M -870 M -270 M -320 M -320 M -380 M -390 M -470 M -342 M -480 M -440 M -850 M -6 deliver M -520 M body.
31:38 I had to do that. And so every morning I used to get up and practice what we call then pumping iron, namely raising the weights, weight lifting, raising it above our heads towards the seeling up up up up up up every morning up and down up and down up and down down notice with one simple single action
32:15 . All the muscles of my body were being simultaneously toned to perfection with one single action.
32:30 Now it is exactly the same with prayer. With prayer we are performing one single action. We are gently trying to raise our heart and mind to God to love Him and to receive His love in return.
32:51 And as we keep gently raising our hearts and minds of God, Nothin' else, to love him, Then his love enters into us And brings to perfection all the spiritual muscles of our heart and mind Simultaneously, Making them into the now the infused virtue With all sorts of gifts …and the fruits of contemplation
33:24 that St Thomas Aquinas tells us about in details, so I won't detail them now, they are given by God to whom ever he'd, who's he to whom, so ever he chooses when he chooses.
33:39 Miracles, prophecy, healing, so on and so forth, but they are only given through love, through His love, as we gently keep trying to receive that love through prayer that leads us on, from consecrating the day to God, to coming to love Him in meditation, to coming to rent into Him through contemplation
34:07 , and to be so open to Him through contemplation that we are aftil with the fruits of contemplation. That's why Saint Thomas calls them the fruits of contemplation because you cannot attain them without contemplation so beware!
34:24 If anybody starts to tell you how to retain the virtues without teaching you how to pray, without teaching you that it is only in contemplation that you receive the infused gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit Je that you received the infused virtues, they are deceiving you.
34:47 A saint Theresa Avola would say. How the key word here is persevering in receiving that love from God.
35:07 Now, one of the great things we had to learn when we were being taught to prepare ourselves to be athletes by Brann's stand for was not only perseverance, but speed training.
35:28 rators if had to learn to be quick of them at, fast, because you might have a brilliant backhand a tremendous smash a devastating fall hand with the ball, your feet you may be able to dribble through half a dozen people or side-step them with your ball in your hands but if you weren't fast enough to
35:56 be there to receive the ball all your abilities, all your greatest gifts, all your genius hands were nothing without, now, now, and we also have to learn, speak what I call speed training.
36:16 And it is this. As we are trying to persevere in learning how to love God in the spiritual life, �B' Girl is my only minor!
36:29 And our prayer begins at the beginning, as the essence of Ito is displayed in Theaxis finds to be dim and which guarantees you to akate yourself.
36:48 That is – the B, and the end of everything The speed with which you get up again, to begin again, and start to do, you see, the real difference between us and the saints is not that they didn't sin and we do, oh no, no, no, no, Hesind, as we sin, but the difference is this, it is the speed with which
37:28 they pick themselves up to begin again immediately without any dallians whatsoever. We fall and we're frustrated, and because we're sinners, we're so disgusted with ourselves, we're ashamed of ourselves, and we don't want to begin again.
37:47 One wants to pick ourselves up and we want to run away!" Remember Genesis, remember, God, and the garden of Eden!
37:59 Adam, Adam, where are you? Now God knew where Adam was, but Adam didn't know where he was! popa'i rелisa rar'i bane'i sa ar auff Westminster We hadilla roda'i bane'i pene waKS maia lila' sta, e'i ralsa'u' s' zu' i guan nai adapago helpsuite alopta'i stemue lamae Manbrue ki hum diamese la ca sa janu hod血u
38:32 bi briefly …that comes before the form. …but it is the pride that follows the form. …that prevents us getting up and starting again.
38:49 Saint Francis of Assisi used to say, …the moment you fall, you must get up immediately, …accept your sinfulness, confess it, …receive absolution, begin again to persevere.
39:03 So it's all in the perseverance now, this is the key word once you've committed yourself to a spiritual life. Once you've committed yourself to a life of prayer, they will open you to the love of God that brings with it all you need for perfection.
39:20 Once you've committed yourself to that, the key word is perseverance, perseverance, perseverance. aversa, but because you are weak, you will fall many times over.
39:36 Once again, I say, the difference between us and the saints is not that they did not sin and we do, they a communities to r Yes they are living in it, I have the bread in my arms what parents, what is sound when strata jaja bel young Aside she wasик neuterber , ylk s 오�nellēj bethon ually for God's Grace
40:23 me anymore. When they begin again, it means persevering, persevering again in what in trying to love God, trying to open yourself up in such a way as to receive the love of God in prayer by gently raising the heart and my into God's spiritual weightlifting, you're only doing one thing.
40:47 You're trying to love God trying to persevere in loving God and eventually now as you persevere to coming to love Him in meditation and then being led into Him through contemplation, in within through Christ you now begin to receive the infused virtues from the love of God that are disseminated into
41:13 every part of percepciona. So everything in the spiritual life is so simple, that's why I said before we are called Catholics, not that we are in every country of the world, but this our faith is for everybody from the humblest to the most intellectual.
41:40 Why? Because it's about learning to love luvun practising love, persevering in love, and the moment we fall, getting ourselves up off the ground to begin again, and again, and again.
42:02 When you stop falling, you're in heaven. …but when you stop getting up, you're in hell, even in this life.
42:21 It's all in the getting up, beginning again and persevering. So, although much of what I've said maybe in this talk, maybe perhaps it's difficult to understand, on first hearing, yd Computer I am very clear and very simple and all you need to know is namely that the real setisism you do know and realize
42:46 that the word of setisism as used by Saint Paul, for instance, comes from the Greek word for an athlete because we must become spiritual athletes.
43:00 jellyüniken – do we become spiritualatheles – by doing what I did, by practicing weight, training – but spiritual weight, training, by continually trying – and persevering – , elazing the heart and the mind to God?
43:20 That's all we have to do. First see, God and His kingdom. This is what our lord said – ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― ― Then how we become capable of transmitting God's love to other people, not by getting up on a soapbox necessarily, but just by being
44:09 possessed by the pure, selfless, unconditional loving of God. But other see and seeing they learn to believe. One day St.
44:25 Francis of Assisi was walking through Siena when he met two Dominicans. And those Dominicans, they were very learned.
44:38 They both got, both of them have got very high degrees from the University of Montpellier. …and they were discussing Scripture with some other secular theologians.
44:54 And they were just talking about what a z-cool man, because they couldn't get their minds rounded.
45:05 It didn't seem to make sense, or if it made sense, it didn't seem fair. …and this was the quotation. A Zechal said, You must preach repentance to everybody who you meet.
45:25 And if you don't, here's the rub, and if you don't, you will be responsible for the sins that they fall into.
45:36 They said, we don't understand it and we don't think it is fair. Joo, mae'l presi' Linda se france hasu e Gia', mae estimates nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase nase Jo una hy Barbara Gia', mae'l ben Finlandina כיstände qui Dua Penu
46:02 Oi, mydoma noina Oi, a chi hoh, verifyковata, m' r跟我unuo …and Francis said to them this. He said it is not us, it is God and His love, that calls people to repent and change their life.
46:24 We must so embody God's love in our lives that when anybody meets us, they are called to repentance. by our very being long before we've even opened our mouths, and that's how the faith was transmitted in the early days of the church.
46:45 They were so filled with the love of God that other people encountered the love of God whenever they encountered a Christian.
46:54 They were called to Repentance, to change their lives. And that is the most important thing we can do to call others to change their lives, to call others to repentance, to remember that it's God and His love that calls people to repentance.
47:18 Our job is to embody the love in our lives Pronunciation de presina yse a Не… Fector. De lesus, se trouce la anaestaha.
47:29 Oing colours. Empочna uutama accesses ela, troce me Por solo, desparte m qualité gardensатina fees in the interview when something like this is said.
47:57 Yes, yes, yes, yes, wonderful, you know what you're saying. You're wonderful, but I want to do something. Tell me what I can do.
48:05 Now, if you said, if you said to them, okay, go to the nearest gun shop, get an AK-47, put a fixed bay in the toilet, Filure pockets with angry ladies, get ten thousand Catholics who agree with you and parachute on the Vatican and take it by storm and install and you holy hope, like Peter.
48:40 That's what they want to hear. They want to do something and yet the most important thing ,de nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko
49:00 nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nekko nek St.
49:17 Francis said there are two ways of spreading the gospel. The first one is by embodying the love of God in your body as he had told the Dominicans.
49:35 That's the first one so that God in you calls people to repent. ид SH'A的 C liegtrunnuta ere, SH'A gosbul, by embodying the God of love within you.
50:15 Oh, and there's another way, he said, and another way is by preaching. Almost as a second thought. But, if you don't embody the love of God that you're preaching to other people in your body, and that is seeable, tangible, touchable, as it were, then your preaching will be a waste of time en you be written
50:37 off as a hypocrite, so let me finish now by once again reducing everything I've said to utter simplicity.
50:50 Never mind if you don't understand all the workings of what I have said, listen again, I'll be developing them later in later talks, but the bottom line is omnibia ddu i bra wio i vole mue ar pe'ge erakib habe Crox, ibeneo a tekoen?
51:12 bla hofas? Norwegian g enm flara au mue wo sotegmentao o in pride, no endlessly running away from God as Adam did in the Garden of Eden, begin again, again, and again, and again.
51:42 And in your trying, remember, in your trying, in your gently trying to raise your heart and the mind to God, You are dying to self and opening yourself to the only love that can save, sanctify and redeem you and enable Christ to save, sanctify the world through you.
52:16 …is there is only one way to perfection … …and that is to pray … …if anyone points … …in another direction … …then they are deceiving you … …are they not?