Sr Emmanuel’s October 2020 Report

2. Do you know this fable? It is the story of a huge elephant and a tiny little mouse. They loved each other tenderly and deeply enjoyed every hour they spent together. They were often seen happily talking to each other, here or there, in the forests of Africa or in the deserts. Their favorite game was to race. One day, these two tireless creatures started racing side by side in a large bare desert with dry sand, to see who could run the fastest in this huge landscape. They were enthusiastically running further and further, when suddenly, the little mouse turned around and proudly shouted at the elephant:

“Oh, elephant, did you see the big cloud we raised!”

The little mouse truly had something to marvel at! Here it was, so tiny, and yet such a huge cloud of dust! How did it not realize that this cloud came from the elephant rather than from its tiny legs? How naive and unaware this little mouse was – it’s touching to hear.

We resemble that little mouse! Do we manage to offer our friends a beautiful gourmet meal and the best chocolate cake in the world? Do we build the house of our dreams? Do we release the best-selling song? Are we simply congratulated for some sporting achievement? And how satisfied we are in taking for ourselves all the credit for this success. However, we forget to recognize God at work in everything good, and to thank Him! We forget to give Him back the glory that belongs to Him! Recognizing God’s love and giving Him back the glory due to Him for every blessing is like banking a very precious treasure, knowing that it will continue to multiply into eternal life. Congratulating yourself would be to squander this treasure! Worse yet: Acting for one’s own glory would be to steal what belongs to God. Mary saves us from this peril by giving us this beautiful promise of joy: “Dear children, may all you do be for the glory of God, and then heaven will fill your heart with joy.”

3. How far love can go! A friend from Zagreb told me about this episode that happened under Communism in Croatia, in around 1988. Her mother Gabrijela was imprisoned for over a year in one of those terrible communist prisons, and there she made friends with a woman, Nada Miskulin, who was also a Catholic. Once they were released, having experienced so much suffering, humiliation and deprivation, Nada and Gabrijela remained very close and encouraged each other in their path of faith.

Nada was single and lived with her mother in a large three-bedroom apartment in central Zagreb. The daily early morning Mass at their parish was part of their routine. One day, they learned that in this parish lived a family of 6 children with their parents in a very tiny apartment – an unbearable situation! No sooner had they learned this news, Nada and her mother looked at each other and understood each other’s thoughts without exchanging a word. That same day, they decided to leave their large apartment to this family in exchange for the family’s very small one. They made this move without asking the family for a penny, and left all their furniture for them.

This is a true example of love in action! The children’s joy was immense, but the joy of these two ladies was even deeper! No wonder… Jesus told us, “There is more happiness in giving than there is in receiving” (Acts 20:35)

5.  A skull? I would prefer to ignore this disastrous wave of blackness sparked by Halloween, which is striving to replace or obscure our beautiful feast of All Saints! As if you could wipe out the Saints! But don’t the authors of this confusion realize they are erasing themselves?! In Rome, where I was recently, almost all the shops are overrun with skulls, skeletons and horrible grimacing figures. Is this what we want for our children?

I recall the words of the great exorcist, Don Gabriele Amorth: “Celebrating Halloween is like celebrating the Devil!” He warned of the dangers to children and young people, as Halloween leads to an increase in occult practices, causes insomnia, mental illness, depression and suicidal impulses in children. “Psychological and psychiatric studies,” he says, “show that children no longer sleep, are restless, depressed, obsessive and suicidal.” The typical trap from our enemy is that it seems to be an innocent game, all the better to seduce children who are not yet aware of the dangers of this world! In reality, says Don Amorth, “It’s like singing Hosannas to the Devil!”

And what about the common saying, “but everyone is doing it!”? Is there a law that requires people to do what everyone else is doing? Who can force parents to do what everyone else is doing when they see the trap that will damage their children? Jesus never asked anyone to do what everyone else is doing, on the contrary! Please, Jesus, deliver us from dangerous customs!