"The Crime of Love"

NEW BOOK! "Our Pilgrimage with the Pilgrim Virgin" click here

January 19, 1911 – Volume 10

Luisa writes:

In hearing of the difficulties raised by the priests, especially about breaking the bond with their families completely, and that it was impossible to carry this out in the way said by blessed Jesus, and that if this were true, He should speak to the Pope, for he, who has authority, could command everyone and sort this work out - I was repeating all this to blessed Jesus, and I was lamenting to Him, saying: ‘My Highest Love, was I not right in telling You to go to the leaders to say these things, for if You say them to me, little ignorant one, what can I do?’ And my always lovable Jesus told me: “My daughter, write, do not fear, I am with you. My word is eternal, and what cannot do good here, can do good elsewhere – what cannot be carried out in these times, will be carried out in other times. But this is how I want the priest – untouchable by the bond of the families. Ah, you do not know what the spirit of the priests of these times is! It is in nothing dissimilar from that of the secular – a spirit of revenge, of hatred, of interest, of blood. Now, having to live together, if one earns more than the other and does not leave it for the good of all, one will feel overtaken, one defrauded, another humiliated, believing that he too would be good at making that earning; and therefore brawls, rancors, displeasures… They would even come to blows. Your Jesus told you, and that’s enough. This point is necessary; it is the pillar, it is the foundation, it is the life, it is the nourishment of this work. If it could work without it, I would not have insisted so much. Then, my daughter, take a look at how rough and ignorant of divine things they are. I do not have their way of thinking, such that they go lapping up and crawling for dignities. In communicating Myself to souls, I do not look at dignities – whether they are bishops or popes; but I look at whether they are stripped of everything and of everyone. I look at whether everything – everything in them is love for Me; I look at whether they have scruples about making themselves the masters of even one single breath, of one heartbeat. And in finding them all love, I do not look at whether they are ignorant, abject, poor, despised and made of dust. Dust itself I convert into gold; I transform it in Me; I communicate all of Myself to it; I entrust to it my most intimate secrets; I make it share in my joys and in my sorrows. Even more, since they live in Me by virtue of love, it is no wonder that they are aware of my Will about souls and about my Church. One is their life with Me; one is the Will, and one is the light with which they see the truth according to the divine visions, and not according to the human. This is why I do not toil in communicating Myself to these souls, and I raise them above all dignities.” Then, clasping me and kissing me, He told me: “My beautiful daughter – but beautiful of my own beauty, you afflict yourself because of the things they say? Do not afflict yourself. Ask father B., poor child of Mine, how much he suffered because of Me from his superiors, from his brothers and from others, to the point of declaring him a fool, an enchanter, and of making it a duty for themselves to penalize him. And what was his crime? Love! Feeling ashamed of their lives compared to his, they waged war on him, and still do. Ah! how costly is the crime of love! Love costs Me much, and much it costs my dear children! But I love him very much, and because of what he has suffered, I have given. ... But since I am with him, I render their arts vain. Give him courage, but – oh! how terrible will be the judgment I will make on those who dare to mistreat my dear children!”

– Servant of God, Luisa Piccarreta