“You still think too little of my goodness and my love” (Father’s message to Sister Eugenia Ravasio).
We can interpret these words of our Heavenly Father in different ways. On the one hand, it is a statement that recalls Jesus’ frequent rebukes of His disciples for their lack of faith (see, for example, Mt 16:9). Surely our Father wants us to understand that His goodness and love are immeasurable and that it grieves Him greatly that we do not yet know it well enough.
We know that He wants to give us everything in abundance – indeed, in superabundance – and that it is we who set limits when we do not trust God enough to allow His love to be poured out on us.
This is deeply regrettable, for what could happen – both in our personal lives and in our mission and witness – if we thought bigger of God! But we must not lament and grieve that this is so, as if these words of the Father were an unchangeable reality to which we must surrender. Rather, we must see them as an invitation from our Father and a challenge of His love.
If we interpret it in this way, it will become a constant plea to our Father. Just as the disciples asked Jesus: “Increase our faith!” (Lk 17:5), we can knock at the Father’s door to increase our trust, taking the appropriate steps to do so. Let us ask the Holy Spirit to help us to reflect on the greatness of God’s goodness and love, to understand it more deeply and to be inflamed by it.
This is a challenge that, if we accept it hand in hand with the Father, will make our hearts ever wider, for “the measure of love is to love without measure”, as St Bernard of Clairvaux says.
He who loves forgets himself and gives himself completely to a “you”, to our heavenly Father. Perhaps this is where our limits often lie, but this must no longer be the case!
Let us keep these words of St. Francis de Sales for our journey: “To be able to receive God’s grace in our heart, it cannot be full of ourselves”.