“All Christ’s riches ‘are for every individual and are everybody’s property’ ” (CCC 519)

A meditation by F.W. Faber…

Jesus belongs to us.

He vouchsafes to put Himself at our disposal.

He loves us with a love which no words can tell, nay, above all our thought and imagination; and He condescends to desire, with a longing which is equally indescribable, that we should love Him, with a fervent and entire love.

His merits may be called ours as well as His. His satisfactions are not so much His treasures as they are ours. His sacraments are but so many ways which His love has designed to communicate Him to our souls.

Wherever we turn in the church of God, there is Jesus.

He is the beginning, middle, and end of everything to us.

He is our help in penance, our consolation in grief, our support in trial.

There is nothing good, nothing holy, nothing beautiful, nothing joyous, which He is not to His servants.

No one need be poor, because, if he chooses, he can have Jesus for his own property and possession. No one need be downcast, for Jesus is the joy of heaven, and it is His joy to enter into sorrowful hearts.

We can exaggerate about many things; but we can never exaggerate our obligations to Jesus, or the compassionate abundance of the love of Jesus to us. All our lives long we might talk of Jesus, and yet we should never come to an end of the sweet things that are to be said about Him.

Eternity will not be long enough to learn all He is, or to praise Him for all He has done; but then that matters not; for we shall be always with Him, and we desire nothing more.

He has kept nothing back from us. There is not a faculty of His Human Soul which has not had to do with our salvation. There is not one limb of His Sacred Body which has not suffered for us. There is not one pain, one shame, one indignity, which He has not drained to its last dreg of bitterness on our behalf. There is not one drop of His most Precious Blood which He has not shed for us; nor is there one beating of His Sacred Heart which is not an act of love to us.

We know our own unworthiness. We hate ourselves for our own past sins. We are impatient with our own secret meanness, irritability, and wretchedness. We are tired with our own badness and littleness.

Yet, for all that, He loves us with this unutterable love, and is ready, if need be, as He revealed to one of His servants, to come down from heaven to be crucified over again for each one of us.

Oh, how is it we can ever turn ourselves away from this one idea! How is it we can take an interest in anything but this surpassing love of God for His fallen creatures!

Comment: The essence of what Father Faber is saying is that Jesus lived his life for us, and all that he merited by his life of expiation and suffering he shares with us. Another great spiritual writer says, “We must hope and expect great things from God, because the merits of our Lord belong to us…. His merits, His satisfactions, His graces are inexhaustible. He is so lavish of them that He offers them unceasingly to all the world, more ready to give than we are to receive….Everything in our Lord Jesus Christ belongs to us in a most special manner” (Father Lallemant, The Spiritual Doctrine, as edited).

Jesus belongs to me! Oh Jesus, I trust in you!

Tom Mulcahy

References: The edited quote from Father Faber (1814—1863) is from the very beginning of his famous book, All for Jesus.

To SHARE on SOCIAL MEDIA: click on “Leave a comment” or “Comments” below (and this will bring up social media icons if they are not already present).