Divine Filiation

By Fr. Conor Donnelly

(Proofread)

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me. I adore you with profound reverence. I ask your pardon for my sins and grace to make this time of prayer fruitful. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

A number of years ago, I was giving a retreat in the south of Spain, just after being ordained, to a group of men.

There was an 80-year-old man who came to chat on the very first morning of the retreat, which was a bit unusual. Normally, people wait a bit or towards the end of the retreat.

He came to chat, and he told me that he did not want to come on this retreat. But the center where he was going for recollections for a number of years, the director there, invited him to come on this retreat.

He said, “Initially, I said no.” And he said, “I had three very good reasons for saying no. One is that I train a certain type of horses and there are some buyers coming from France to buy some of my horses this weekend and I wanted to be there.

“Secondly, there are some people coming to put drains on my house. I've been waiting two years for them to put drains on my house. I wanted to be there when they came.

“And thirdly, this is the week of the local fiesta, and I haven't missed the fiesta ever since I was seven years of age. All my friends will be there. It's a time when we catch up. It's the social event of the year. It was just unthinkable for me to come on a retreat on these particular days, so I said no.

“Two weeks later, he asked me again, and again, I said no. And he asked me a third time, and again, I said no. But after a while, I found that each time I said no, I became more and more uncomfortable. The only way I could get any peace was by saying yes.

“So I came to the retreat last night, and I've only been here a few hours, and already I'm very glad I came, because, you see, I've been attending these recollections of Opus Dei for the last number of years, and I keep hearing about a thing called divine filiation, spiritual childhood, life of childhood, I'm a child of God.”

He said, “Here I am, 80 years of age, and they're telling me to become like a child. I could never understand what that means. Am I supposed to put on short pants or what?”

“But,” he said, “now I've come to realize what that means. I have to abandon myself into the arms of my Father God. I've got to let Him make the decisions; let Him make the calls. I'm not here just to do my will, I'm here to do His will.”

It was as though that man had discovered “the pearl of great price” (Matt. 13:45-46). Over those few days of retreat, it was as though he rejuvenated by about twenty years. He became the life and soul of the party.

We're told by St. John, “You must see what great love the Father has lavished on us by letting us be called God's children, which is what we are. The reason why the world does not acknowledge us is that it did not acknowledge him” (1 John 3:1).

One of the central ideas of the teaching of St. Josemaría that God gave him a special grace to see and to understand and to preach was that we are children of God.

“The Spirit himself joins with our spirits,” says St. Paul, “to bear witness that we are children of God. What you received was not the spirit of slavery to bring you back into fear; you received the spirit of adoption, enabling us to cry out, ‘Abba, Father’” (Rom. 8:14-15).

In another place, he says, “All who are guided by the spirit of God are sons of God” (Rom. 8:14).

We just celebrated the great feast of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit coming into our soul. We are “temples of the Holy Spirit” (1 Cor. 6:19).

One of the fruits of that grace in our soul is that we come to realize a little more that I am a child of God. God is not far away from me; He's beside me all the time. He's speaking to me in my soul in grace.

External manifestations are not always the best evidence of closeness. Our closest friends are sometimes far from us, which doesn't prevent them from loving us dearly.

The Father is not necessarily close to his children throughout their lives, but he remains no less concerned about them.

We might feel that Our Father God is far away or wonder where He is in certain moments of our lives, when life strikes. And yet we know in faith that Our Father God is beside us all the time.

When we feel that He's far away, that's when He's closer to us than ever.

We can ask Our Lord, through the grace of the Holy Spirit, to be more aware of our divine affiliation. It’s something that we have to try and put into practice in a regular way every day.

When we wake up in the morning, when we go to work, when we hit a bit of a snag, when there's a challenge, a roadblock, a difficulty in our life, in our profession, in our health, in our finances, it can be enormously consoling to know that I’m carried in the palm of the hand of a God who loves me.

My Father God is beside me. If He has brought me to this, He will bring me through it. He's speaking to me through this circumstance.

Sometimes in our life, God may sweep the feet from under us and leave us hanging there. But if He does that, it's because He wants us to look up, to learn what it means to be a child of God, to learn what real hope is, real trust is, real abandonment is.

Sometimes, these are the greatest lessons of our life. We might think we know what hope and trust and abandonment are, or optimism, but it's only when we hit one of those situations that we really learn what it's all about.

I remember years ago, when I was living in Singapore, I passed by this lady who had converted to Catholicism. She'd been a Protestant for many years and then she discovered the Catholic faith.

Shortly after that, her husband converted. He was an orthopedic surgeon and he was a professor of orthopedic surgery. He liked his teaching very much.

But then at 51 years of age, he got cancer of the thyroid and the larynx. Two cancers. For most people, one cancer is enough. But he got caught with a double whammy.

She asked me to go and see her husband in hospital. He was a recent convert and I expected that when I went to see him, he would ask me questions like, “Father, why this?” “Why now?” “Why me?”

I was preparing myself for those questions. But when I went into the hospital room, before I could say anything, he said to me, “Father, I see this event as a wake-up call for my children. I have three daughters; they're 21, 20, and 19. They're all in college. They're having a good time. They don't know what life is all about.”

I was very impressed with the supernatural approach of that recent convert. Trust in God. Abandonment. Real faith. Real hope. Real optimism. Seeing the positive side of the realities that God had brought him to.

If we are a child of God, we will realize that Our Father God is speaking to us in all sorts of moments.

A lady told me once—she was a very busy professional lady, she had helped to set up an airline in a certain city of Asia—"I was sitting in the garden one day, and I began to look at some of the roses in the garden. As I looked at the roses, I was thinking that man has been able to put men in the moon, but no man can make a rose like that.”

She said, “That was the moment of my conversion.” She resigned from her position, and she became a sort of a Mother Teresa in her city, taking care of AIDS patients. She spent the rest of her life doing that.

God speaks to us in all situations. Sometimes He speaks to us very clearly, very deeply. Sometimes He invites us to a radical conversion.

Sometimes He just reminds us to say our Morning Offering or our Angelus, or to spend a bit more time with a certain child, or to bring flowers to our wife—whispers in our ear small things.

It helps us to behave like a child of God, and to realize that ‘I owe everything to Him.’

After the Feast of Pentecost, we're now going towards the Feast of the Blessed Trinity. These are very good days to raise our heart and mind in thanksgiving to the Blessed Trinity, because everything we are and we have, we owe to God.

St. Paul said, “What have you that you have not received?” (1 Cor. 4:7). Everything is a gift.

It's a great way to live, giving thanks, realizing that we are the recipient of so many things. We're just small children; we can do nothing on our own.

If professionally, or financially, or health-wise, things have worked out for us, it's because it's the will of Our Father God.

And if they haven't worked out for us, we find ourselves at the bottom of a current; in the biggest mess we've ever been in in our life; everything gray around us; nothing looking good, that's also because that's the will of Our Father God.

He's brought us into that situation, perhaps to teach us what life is all about and to help us to learn about our pathway to heaven.

“Unless you become like little children, you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 18:3).

There was a mother once who had a six-year-old little boy, and she noticed that her son had a bit of an ear for music, so she wanted to expose him to good music.

In the town, there was going to be a recital by a concert pianist. She brought the kid along to the local hall where this was taking place.

Then she noticed that there was a friend of hers about three rows away, so she told her son to stay where he was, and she was going to go and greet her friend.

When the mother was gone, he thought, ‘Now's my chance to explore this place.’ He left his seat and he began to walk around the place, and he found a door that says, “No admittance.”

He said, ‘Ah, this is what I want: adventure.’ He pushed through the door.

A few minutes later, the lights were dimmed to signal that it was the start of the concert, and the mother went back to her place to find that her son wasn't there. She began to panic a little bit.

But just then the curtains rose, and lo and behold, there was her six-year-old at a grand piano on the stage, playing “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.”

This was the moment that the great maestro chose to make his entrance, and he was a bit surprised to find a little kid playing this tune at his great piano.

But he whispered in the ear of the kid: ‘Keep playing, don't stop.’ He put one arm at one end of the keyboard, and the other arm at the end of the keyboard, and began to accompany the kid in the duet playing, “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.”

The audience were amazed. They thought, ‘Wow, this is real genius! What an original way to start a concert!’

We’re a little bit like that kid, plodding away at the piano keys. God comes and puts one arm around us on one side and the other on the other, and converts what we're doing into the work of genius. It's all His work, Deo omnis gloria–all the glory to God (cf. Eph. 3:21, 1 Cor. 1:31).

We think with our little efforts, our little thoughts, our little initiatives, that we achieve great things. But it's only because Our Father God is there, helping us to achieve all these things.

One of the expressions of being a child of God is to try and turn to that Father of ours many times each day, and thank Him, or give Him glory.

That realization that we managed to find this parking space, or get this deal done, or make somebody smile—it's because Our Father God is helping all those things to happen. We are nothing on our own.

In moments of fear or trepidation or concern or anxiety or worry, we can turn to Our Father God and leave things in His hands. In many ways, that's what our Morning Offering is all about: “O Jesus, through the most pure heart of Mary, I offer you all my thoughts, words, actions, sufferings, feelings on this day.…”

We offer Him everything. It can be a pretty good prayer to pray frequently as we move through the day. We realize that He's there waiting for us around every corner.

There was a four-year-old kid once who spilled some Coca-Cola on the kitchen floor. He wanted to mop it up himself because he was already older now—he's four. He went to get the mop. The mop was outside the kitchen.

But halfway to the door, he realized that it got dark outside, and he was afraid of the dark.

His mother was there and she realized why he suddenly stopped in his tracks—because he was afraid of the dark. She said to him, “It's okay, don't worry, Jesus is also there in the dark.”

He went to the door, he poked his head out and he shouted out, “Hey Jesus, if you're out there, could you please pass me the mop?” The little kid learned how to find God in the darkness.

In the darkness of our lives, Our Father God is always there waiting for us, perhaps waiting to give us new lights about certain truths or doctrines or about our own life; helping us to see things with a deeper perspective, with a new faith, a new hope, a new humility, a new charity; helping us to see that we're called along the pathway of love, to bring love to our life each day, to our children, sometimes just with our mere presence.

Irrespective of what may be happening in the office, or in our finances, or with our boss, we need to remind ourselves, ‘I am a child of God.’

You may have seen many years ago a movie called Dead Man Walking. It was about a nun who was counseling a man on death row.

She was helping him to prepare for his execution—trying to help him to find faith, and trust, and optimism, and comfort, and consolation, so many other things.

At one moment, she said to him, “Did you ever know that you were a son of God?”

He said, “You know, I've been called a son of many things in my life, but I have never been called a son of God.”

All of us have to make that realization at some stage in our life. It is something real.

My Father God is a Father who loves me, who follows me step by step, who protects me, who understands me. He waits for a response of love from each one of us.

From Him we learn how to be a good father, to spend time with our children, to talk to them, to listen to them on a regular basis, to create the atmosphere of a home, to try and live like a great human being, so they can grow up knowing what that means, so that they also want to be like a great human being, a great father.

Try and train your daughter to be a great mother, and your son to be a great father, so that they can learn a little bit more about their Father God, and also trust in Him, and have optimism in Him, in spite of their miseries and their mistakes. We all make a lot of mistakes. Many children make lots of mistakes.

A little kid came home from school one day and told his mother that he had a big pain in his tummy. The mother said, “That's because there's nothing in it. You put something in it, and you'll feel much better.”

A few days later the parish priest came to call. In the course of the conversation, he happened to say that he had a terrible headache. The five-year-old kid piped up and said, “That's because there's nothing in it. You put something in it, and you'll feel much better.”

Children make mistakes, and they fail. But they begin again.

The fact that we can consider the paternal presence of Our Heavenly Father, who accompanies us everywhere—that can give us an unshakable confidence. The fact that God is my Father means that I have every reason to be cheerful, optimistic, transmitting joy to other people, patient, kind.

It can be the basis of our charity; change the atmosphere where we may be in other people's lives. It means that at every moment we can confide in Our Heavenly Father.

It means we never feel alone or afraid, because my Father God is with me, and nothing harmful therefore can happen to me. I'm on a pathway to heaven.

We don't need to fear anything, especially death, because that's the way I go to meet my Heavenly Father.

There’s no need for us to fear a stroke, or a heart attack, or cancer. These things aren't evils. These are the things of the pathway to the eternal wedding feast, for us to be with Our Heavenly Father forever.

It's a great truth for us to teach our children; to let them be aware of the fleeting nature of this life. It doesn't matter what happens. “All things turn out for the good” (Rom. 8:28) because of our eternal destiny.

Therefore, we never feel afraid about anything, because Our Father God is with us.

“If you, evil as you are,” said Our Lord, “know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask Him?” (Matt: 7:11).

“How much more...?” It's a beautiful phrase.

Even if our world might seem to be collapsing, or the world of people around us might seem to be collapsing, we know that Our Father God is at work in this moment, instilling virtue, leading us forward in holiness, teaching us how to carry the cross, teaching us about authentic virtue, perhaps reminding us that we're called to that goal of holiness.

The eternal wedding feast—that's what it's all about, because God is my Father. In the cross, when it appears, I don't see punishment, but rather a mission—a mission entrusted by the Lord Himself.

In Gethsemane, “Our Lord withdrew from the apostles, a stone’s throw, and kneeling down, he began to pray. He said, ‘Father, if it is possible, let this chalice pass from me’” (Luke 22:41-42).

Our Lord was confronted with the greatest amount of human suffering that any human person ever had to endure. Christ was no masochist. He didn't say, Roll on, suffering; I love suffering.

He recoiled away from it in horror and disgust: “Take this chalice away from me.” But then He said, “Yet not my will, rather yours be done” (Matt. 26:39) as though welcoming the will of God, which is the greatest reality in our life.

St. Josemaría in The Way says, “Abandonment to the will of God is the secret of happiness on earth” (Josemaría Escrivá, The Way, Point 766).

If you were to set up a stall on Highlands and Lassie Avenue and advertise the secret of happiness on earth, you might have a long queue. Yet we know the secret: it's abandonment to the will of God, the will of Our Heavenly Father.

That prayer of Our Lord in Gethsemane starts with the word Father: “Father, if it is possible, let this chalice pass.”

The most important word in the phrase comes first. There is no contradiction between the fact that you are my loving Father and you're about to visit me with the greatest amount of human suffering any person ever experienced.

We don't need to fear anything, because ‘I'm in the hands of my loving Father.’

All through our life we've tried to maintain that childlike heart. There's a Chinese philosopher called Mencius, a disciple of Confucius, who said, “A great person is one who never loses the heart he had as a child.”

Love of family, love of country, love of truth, love of life.

Lord, help me to maintain that heart of a child, to be childlike in my piety.

When I go to receive Holy Communion every day, savoring those Communions with a new fervor, asking the Holy Spirit to lead me up onto a new level in my divine filiation, in my abandonment, my trust, my optimism; that I pray like a child, I ask like a child, I'm optimistic and cheerful like a child.

Children often don’t worry about things. They don't just believe in their parents; they hope in them—hope in them to solve all their problems. They know how to forget their problems each night and go to sleep, and sleep well, and wake up well the following day. Worries don't last.

We also have to know that we are a child of God in Christ, and that means we have to try and act like a child, react like a child, put into practice that faith, that hope, that optimism, that transparency.

Sincerity when we go to Confession: we're going to pour out all the bad things we've done about Father God and the sacrament. Get rid of all the dross that may be there, the things that weigh us down.

Help other people to discover this great sacrament when we savor the mercy of Our Father God, who always forgives us, helps us to begin again.

Our Father God's patience with us leads us to be patient with others; to be uncomplicated, serene. If ever we have some anxiety or some apprehension, we leave it in the hands of Our Father God.

We've been created to be children—childlike, not complex. “Thank God for everything, because everything is good” (J. Escrivá, TheWay, Point 268).

We live this childlike spirit in prayer, in our struggle, in spiritual direction, in obedience, in our defeats, in our miseries, in our apostolate, in our studies, in our problems with our blood family.

We say with great confidence: “All things turn out for the good” (Rom 8:28). Try to see good in everything.

St. Josemaría in The Way of the Cross says, “May our stumbles and defeats separate us from him no more. Just as a feeble child throws itself contritely into the strong arms of its father, you and I will hold tightly to the yoke of Jesus.

“Only a contrition and humility like this can transform our human weakness into the fortitude of God” (J. Escrivá, The Way of the Cross, Seventh Station).

He also says, “You are discouraged, why? Is it your sins and miseries? Is it your defeats, at times coming one after the other? A really big fall, which you didn't expect? Be simple, open your heart. Look: as yet nothing has been lost.” You can still go forward, and with more love, with more affection, with more strength.

“Take refuge in your divine sonship: God is your most loving Father. In this lies your security, a haven where you can drop anchor no matter what is happening on the surface of the sea of life. You will find joy, strength, optimism, victory!” (Ibid.).

There are times in our life when we need to cry. All men cry. The sign of our humanity. Little children cry.

A priest in Asia told me once how there was a great chess competition once between Sparsky, I think it was, and a computer. And the computer won. He beat the great chess champion in the world. Then the chess champion broke down and cried.

The priest said, “In that he proclaimed his greatness, his humanity. The computer doesn't know how to cry.”

Sometimes we all need to seek out somebody that we can cry with. We shouldn't cry alone.

Our Father God has given us spiritual direction, Confession—the ability to go to somebody and to cry there with them; to get rid of those tears so as to begin again; to realize that things are not as bad as all that, and to infuse a new hope, a new trust in Our Father God, who permits things to make us depend totally on Him.

This coming week, we can perhaps grow in those acts of thanksgiving and help other people around us to be more grateful to God for the good things that He's given to us.

When we lose sight of our divine filiation, that we are children of God, everything can begin to go wrong, because we can think that we're strong and we're made to be successful; or that we can do all sorts of things with the power of our hands.

That's when we begin to fail. God can use even our faults and failures. Like an oyster, a piece of grit can produce “a pearl of great price” (Matt. 13:46). We can ask Our Lord, that He might teach us to put that divine filiation into practice more frequently.

We’re told in The Forge, “Draw strength from your divine filiation. God is a Father—your Father!—full of warmth and infinite love. —Call him ‘Father’ frequently and tell him, when you're alone, that you love him, that you love him very much!, and that you feel proud and strong because you are his son” (J. Escrivá, The Forge, Point 331).

We can ask Our Lady, Daughter of God the Father, Mother of God the Son, Spouse of God the Holy Spirit, that she might help us to grow more each day in our awareness of our divine filiation.

I thank you, my God, for the good resolutions, affections, and inspirations that you have communicated to me during this meditation. I ask your help to put them into practice. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

MVF