[00:00] Praise be Jesus and Mary. What beautiful words St. Paul spoke to us in the second reading in his letter to the Romans when he says, "I urge you brothers by the mercies of God to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God."

[00:34] Why does St. Paul say this? Why does he exhort us to have this, to be living sacrifices? The reason is because that's precisely what we are called to do. What is a living sacrifice? Well firstly let's look at what love truly is. True love is a gift of self, I give myself for another. It's expressed in the best way in sacrifice. That's what it entails. There's some kind of self-denial behind this self-gift.

[01:06] I can't give myself without some kind of denial of self. So it's the language of true love, love that is giving itself. It denies self to give self to the other. And so we find sacrifice is an integral part, a necessary expression of true love. If true love was just a feeling, it was just kind of this warm fuzzy feeling, well it would

[01:37] very easily become something that is just self-seeking. In other words, I like this thing, I love this thing, why? Because it makes me feel good. So I'm actually seeking my own interests. Whereas a love that knows how to forget self, and even if there's a cost to myself, I still choose that because I want to go to the other person. That's where love displays itself as perfect and selfless. So that's why sacrifice is an essential element of our Christian lives. That's why we have the cross.

[02:10] The cross is the language of true love, self-giving love, love that forgets self, that gives itself for God and for neighbor. And that's why St. Paul says, "I urge you to become, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice." In other words, to make of our whole lives an offering to God, to live in a manner that is a continuous gift of ourselves to Him through little sacrifices that are constantly embraced

[02:41] and offered through the acceptance of little daily crosses, through that offering of a continual prayer to God on the altar of our hearts, a prayer of thanksgiving, of praise, of adoration, of love. So this continual action of adoration and worship of God and of greater love for Him expresses already said several times through sacrifice. And all this finds its most perfect model in the sacrifice that our Lord Jesus Christ

[03:16] embraced for us on Calvary, where He himself said, "You know, no man can have greater love than him who lays down his life for his friends." Certainly the human way of thinking about this just doesn't understand it. And that exactly, that's exactly what happened to St. Peter. Bear in mind that this was before he received the special graces linked to his, to him being chosen as first Pope.

[03:46] This was even before the passion of our Lord, our Lord gave him the special graces later on. But in this particular moment, when he begins to hear Jesus talk about passion and suffering and being killed, he just, you know, he's prayed to this rebellion to the point where he says, "Lord, this just won't be." In his mind, you know, the Messiah should be a triumphant Messiah. What can, what could death have to do with a Messiah? This Messiah has to, you know, reign over the enemies of Israel, destroy them.

[04:19] But if he is killed, well, what sense does it make? This is what St. Peter was thinking. But what do we hear our Lord say? "Get behind me, Satan." Maybe the strongest rebuke that our Lord ever uses in the gospel. And it was, and then he goes on to say, "You are thinking not as God thinks, but as man thinks." And isn't this what happens so often, even amongst those who consider themselves Christians?

[04:50] Some kind of, you know, cross turns up and we immediately sort of think that absolutely the grace we need to ask for is that this cross be removed. We don't accept that cross. We rebel against it. And so we're just applying a human, entirely human way of thinking. So obviously it is licit to ask that crosses be alleviated in their weight, especially if we're asking for this grace for others. But to just not accept any cross that arrives that, you know, that we have to accept and

[05:22] that touches us and to have some kind of rebellion every time that a cross or difficulty or trouble turns up means not having understood the nature of true love and sort of having this mindset of St. Peter. "Lord, it shall not be." And our Lord is going to say to us, "But you're thinking in a way that is entirely human. You're not thinking in a way that is supernatural." The saints didn't rebel in the face of the cross. They embraced it. "Lord, this cost me, but I want it for you."

[05:57] That's true love. It's a choice. It's nothing other than a choice. Yeah, that doesn't mean it won't cost sometimes. If it didn't cost, well, they wouldn't be, you know, it just wouldn't have that quality of a true gift of self, you know, but the cost is what seals the fact that I'm giving myself. So what we need to ask for in the face of the cross is once again, it is licit, especially in the face of crosses that are particularly heavy, we can ask and we should ask above all for the grace to bear them.

[06:28] We can, it's licit to ask that our Lord remove them, but always with the condition that that be according to His will, because most of the crosses that visit us are allowed by God for our sanctification. So asking Him just to remove them means removing the opportunity for our sanctification, our growth in love. What will generally happen though is that if we embrace them for love of God and we offer them to Him, we make of ourselves a living sacrifice in the midst of, you know,

[07:01] under the weight of that cross and obviously bear in mind that all of this is possible only if we have a quality life of union with God. So constant life of prayer, sacramental life, and a correct understanding of things in faith. We don't have these things, we're never going to be able to face and to accept our crosses. But if we do have this and when they come, we accept them, we'll actually discover that by doing that well, by making this choice to accept them for love of God, they actually

[07:32] weigh a lot less. Because then you begin to experience the joy of true love, which is the joy that comes from being satisfied. It's a superior joy. The world seeks the joy that comes just from being satisfied. When my ego is satisfied, that's when I think I can have the peak of happiness. Actually, that's not true at all. That almost always goes together with like a momentary peak in, you know, as far as the senses are concerned, in some kind of maybe adrenaline rush, you know, but then afterwards

[08:03] it leaves you in completely empty. There is true love that goes together with this gift of self, this forgetfulness of self, this denial of self for love of God, and this is very often expressed through our neighbor. In other words, we're loving God by bearing with crosses that regard our neighbor or serving directly our neighbor. These go together to the degree in which we grow in virtue and charity with a supernatural

[08:36] joy, a joy that remains and that even increases, the joy of giving oneself for God, the joy of true love. So once again, the Christian life is not simply about receiving God's love, it's about allowing God's love to transform us until we ourselves become a return to Him of love. We return God's love by offering ourselves as a living sacrifice. We do that, as I explained, by self-denial.

[09:10] This is actually the element which is perhaps the most lacking in the lives of so many Christians. So we might have some prayer, but we have no self-denial. In other words, very often you find this idea where, yeah, I know I need to pray, so there's going to be some moment of prayer, but God is just going to make me feel good, He's just going to give me peace, but nowhere will I actually learn to give myself for Him. If He allows troubles to turn up, I can just turn my back on Him, because if He's a good

[09:43] God He just has to make me feel good. That's once again applying an entirely worldly human way of thinking and reducing divine love to a love that is entirely human and actually very imperfectly human. True love gives of itself. It embraces that cross because it wants to express a higher love. So this is a grace we need to ask for, certainly a grace that Our Lady wants to obtain for us. It's something that is so beautifully manifest in her life, which contrary to what some people

[10:19] might think, wasn't a life of ease and just kind of holiness put on a plate. She did receive some special graces from God, some very special graces, unique, starting with her Immaculate Conception, but she was not exempt from suffering. Our Lady suffered throughout her whole life. We meditate on just seven of these moments of her sufferings with a crown of seven sorrows, so that's just, here's already seven. Seven is a biblical number for many, so beyond those there are going to be a whole lot more.

[10:55] She suffered constantly, as she told St. Bridget. She revealed once to St. Bridget that her whole life, from the moment of the incarnation of Jesus in her womb, was a mother's sorrow knowing that He would one day be crucified. She knew that from the prophet Isaiah. She knew that through the special light that God gave her, so she constantly had this sort of sorrow in her heart. But do we ever hear a word of rebellion from her, a word of complaint, grumbling, blaming others, getting upset, losing patience?

[11:26] None of this. Why? Because she knew how to love. She knew how to make all of this an offering of herself to God. She knew how to offer this in union with our Lord Jesus Christ for our spiritual rebirth, and this is true love. So together with that suffering, she also had the highest joys, the joys that, once again, weren't just being satisfied in something. It was the joy of true love, which is something deeper in the soul.

[11:59] The joy the world seeks is just kind of, you know, satisfaction in the senses, whereas spiritual joy resides in the soul. It's much more perfect, much more elevated, and it's long-lasting. So let us seek this higher joy, but let us know that this higher joy is found in a more perfect love, and this more perfect love is necessarily linked to its highest manifestation, and that is self-sacrifice.

[12:32] We're not talking about, you know, some extraordinary difficult things that we might have read about in saints of ages past. We're talking about just knowing how to accept our daily crosses for love of God. That's where you need to start. Just simple things, the things that already arrived, just accept them for love of God. Offer them to Him in a spirit of faith, with patience. That's all you need to do as a starting point. We can add then to that some little renouncements.

[13:03] Why do you always need to eat the food that you like? Because at least for love of God, renounce the thing you liked a bit more and take something you like less. Something so simple, no one will even notice. Do it silently, hidden, for love of God, but you're loving God, and if you keep doing that, you're growing in love. It's an exercise. So may our Blessed Mother help us to understand all of this. As I was saying a moment ago, this is perhaps that which is most lacking in the life of

[13:35] most Christians. So we're sort of stumbling along, limping along. Spiritual life is two legs, prayer and penance, prayer and sacrifice, prayer and mortification. These are the two legs. If we only have prayer, we're limping, and we're not going to make much progress, whereas if you have prayer and sacrifice, we're going to walk along a lot further. Praise be Jesus and Mary.

[14:31] Amen.