Religions and beliefs

Among the chosen people it should be possible to find everywhere spirits ready to receive the Messiah in Whose expectaion Patriarchs and Prophets were consumed by anxiety, the Messiah Who at last has come, preceded and accompanied by all the prophesied signs, the Messiah, Whose spiritual personality becomes clearer and clearer through the visible miracles worked on bodies and elements, and through the invisible ones worked on consciences which are converted and on Gentiles who turn to the True God. But it is not so. The promptitude in following the Messiah is strongly hindered by the children of that people and, what is sad to be said, it is more hindered the more one climbs to its higher classes. I am not saying this to scandalise you, but to induce you to pray and meditate.

Why does that happen? Why do Gentiles and sinners proceed farther on My way? Why do they accept what I say and the others do not? Because the children of Israel are anchored, or rather, they are stuck like pearl-oysters to the bank where they were born. Because they are filled, overwhelmed and obese with their wisdom and they cannot make room for Mine by throwing away what is superfluous to make room for what is necessary. The others do not suffer from such slavery. They are poor heathens or poor sinners, unimpeded like a boat which is adrift, they are poor people, who have no treasures of their own, but only heaps of errors or sins, of which they gladly strip themselves as soon as they understand what the Gospel is and they taste its fortifying honey, which is quite different from the nauseating mixture of their sins.

• Biblical prophecies
• Fishermen
• Good News
• Israel's mistake - The Jews' mistake
• Messiah
• Miracles of Jesus Christ
• Paganism and pagans
• Pharisees
• Sin
• Wisdom

The children of Israel are anchored, or rather, they are stuck like pearl-oysters to the bank where they were born

• Fishing in the time of Jesus

Now listen to the spirit of the parable.

We have four kinds of fields: the fertile ones, the thorny ones, the stony ones and the ones full of paths. We also have four types of spirits.

There are the honest spirits, the spirits of goodwill, prepared by their own will and by the work of an apostle, of a “true” apostle; because there are apostles who have the name but not the spirit of an apostle and they are more lethal for the will in formation, than birds, thorns and stones, They upset in such a way, through their intolerance, their haste, their reproaches and their threats, as to drive people away from God forever. There are others who, on the contrary, through an excess of benignity, utterly out of place, cause the seed to rot in too soft a soil. Because of their lack of vigour, they kill the vigour of the souls they cure. But let us consider true apostles, that is, the shining mirrors of God. They are paternal, merciful, patient, and at the same time they are strong, as their Lord is strong. Now: the souls prepared by them and by their own will can be compared to the fertile fields, free from stones and brambles, from couch-grass and darnel, in which the word of God thrives and every word, that is every seed, bears a bundle of ears, yielding in some places one hundred, in others sixty per cent. Are there any like that among those who follow Me? There certainly are. And they will be holy. They come from all castes and countries. And there are Gentiles among them and they will yield one hundred per cent because of their goodwill, only because of that, or because of their goodwill and that of an apostle or disciple who prepares them for Me.

• Discipleship - Following Jesus Christ
• Force
• Goodwill
• Holiness
• Homicide - Murder - Assassination
• Honesty
• Kindness
• Mercy and forgiveness
• Paganism and pagans
• Patience
• Reproach
• Severity - Intransigence - Toughness
• Soul
• Virility
• Will
• Work
• haste - haste

And here are the fields full of stones. How many there are in Israel! They are the ones that belong to the “children of the laws” as My cousin Judas quite rightly said. In them there is not the one Stone of Witness, nor the Stone of the Law. There is the quarry poor petty human laws made by men. They are so many that with their weight they have broken also the Stone of the Law into chips. A disaster which does not allow the seed to take root. The root is no longer nourished because there is neither soil nor sap. The water stagnating on the stone pavement causes the seed to rot, the sun makes the stones hot and parches the little plants. Such are the spirits of those who put complicated human doctrines in place of the simple doctrine of God. They even receive My word with joy. At first it shakes and allures them. But later… They would need to be heroes and work hard to clean the field, their souls and minds of all rhetorical stones. The seed would then take root and bear long spikes. As it is… it bears nothing. The fear of human retaliation is enough. It is enough to say: “And after? What will the mighty ones do to me?” and the poor seed languishes without nourishment. It is enough for the whole quarry to stir with the vain sound of the hundreds of precepts, which have been put in place of the Precept, that man perishes with the seed received.. Israel is full of them. That explains why the coming to God is in inverse ratio to human power.

• Anxiety - Fear - Fearfulness
• Cornerstone
• Doctrine
• Heresies and doctrinal errors
• Heroism
• Humanity of men
• Israel's mistake - The Jews' mistake
• Jude of Alphée (apostle)
• Power
• The powerful man
• Word of God - Law of God

«Yes, he will die. He knows as well as I do. Nothing and no one will save him this time. When? I do not know. I know that he will not come out of Herod’s hand alive.»

«Yes, Herod. Listen. John went to the mountain gorge, between Mount Ebal and Gerizim, where we also passed coming back from Galilee, because the traitor said to him: “The Messiah is dying after being attacked by His enemies. He wants to see you to entrust a secret to you”. And he went with the traitor and some other people. Herod’s armed men were in the shade of the valley and they captured him. The others ran away and gave the news to the disciples who had remained near Hennon. They had just come when I arrived with Your Mother. And the dreadful thing is that he was one from our towns… and that the Pharisees of Capernaum are the leaders of the plot to catch him. They went to John saying that You had been their guest and that You were leaving from there to go to Judaea… he would not have left his refuge but for You…»

• Elijah of Capernaum (Pharisee)
• Herod Antipas
• Ignorance of Jesus Christ
• Jesus' omniscience
• Joachim of Capernaum (Sanhedrist and Pharisee)
• Locations - Ennon - Hennon - Enon
• Pharisees
• Places - Mount Garizim
• Prophecies of Jesus Christ

• Jewish calendar

The Kingdom of Heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while the man and his servants were asleep, his enemy came and sowed darnel seeds among the wheat and went away. At first no one noticed anything. Winter came with rain and frost, the end of the month of Tebeth came and the corn sprouted. The tiny little green leaves which had just come up, looked all alike in their innocent early days. The months of Shebat and Adar came and the plants grew and the spikes seeded. They then saw that it was not all wheat, and that there was also darnel, twisted with its thin strong bearbines round the corn stalks.

• Jewish calendar

Peter comes back only the following morning. And he is calmer than when he left, because he was made welcome at Capernaum and the town had been cleared of Eli and Joachim.

«They must have taken part in the plot. Because I asked some friends when they had left, and I understood that they had not come back after going to the Baptist as penitents. And I do not think that they will come back so soon, now that I mentioned that they were present at the arrest… There is much turmoil because of the Baptist’s capture… I will ensure that the whole world knows about it… It is the best weapon we have. I also met Simon, the Pharisee… But if he really is what he appeared to me, I think he is favourably disposed towards us. He said to Me: “Tell the Master not to follow the Jordan along the western valley. The other side is safer” he said stressing the words. And he ended: “I have not seen you. I have not spoken to you. Don’t forget. And mind what you do in mine, yours and everybody’s interest. Tell the Master that I am a friend” and he kept looking up, as if he were speaking to the wind. They are always false, even when doing good things and… and I will say “strange”, so that You will not reproach me. But… ehi!… but I went and I had a little chat with the centurion. Just… to ask: “Is your servant well?”, and when I was told that he was, I said: “That is good! Make sure you keep him healthy because they are laying snares for the Master. The Baptist has already been captured…” and the Roman grasped the idea immediately. A cunning fellow he is! He replied: “Where there is a vexillum, there will be a guard for Him, and there will be someone reminding the Jews that no plot is allowed under the sign of Rome, death or the galley being the punishment”. They are heathens, but I could have kissed him. I like people who understand and take action! So we can go.»

«Let us go. But all that was not necessary» says Jesus.

«It was… it was necessary indeed!» Jesus says goodbye to the hospitable family and also to the new disciple, to whom He must have given some instructions.

• Centurion of Capernaum (Roman officer)
• Elijah of Capernaum (Pharisee)
• Jean-Baptiste
• Joachim of Capernaum (Sanhedrist and Pharisee)
• Romans
• Simon of Capernaum (Pharisee)
• Simon-Pierre - Simon de Jonas (apostle)

Peter, Peter!… For My sake you will have to enter not towns of pleasure but real brothels… Christ did not come to save those who are already saved, but those who are Lost… and you shall be “Peter”, or Rock, not Simon, for that purpose. Are you afraid of becoming contaminated? No! Not even this one, see (and He points at the very young John) will suffer any harm. Because he does not want, as you do not want, as your brother and John’s brother do not want, as none of you, for the time being, wants. As long as one does not want, no harm is done. But one must not want resolutely and perseveringly. You will obtain will-power and perseverance from the Father, by praying with sincere intentions.

• André (apostle)
• James of Zebedee (apostle)
• Jesus' omniscience
• John of Zebedee (apostle)
• Prophecies of Jesus Christ
• Rome

The group proceeds in silence. The main road becomes a town street, paved with one handbreath wide square stones. The houses are more and more splendid and magnificent, surrounded by luxuriant flourishing gardens and orchards. I am under the impression that the elegant Magdala was for the Palestinians a kind of place of pleasure like some towns around our lakes in Lombardy: Stresa, Gardone, Pallanza, Bellagio and so on. Among the rich Paletinians there are many Romans, who must have come from other places, such as Tiberias or Caesarea, possibly officials of the Governor or merchants who export the most beautiful products of the Palestinian colony to Rome.

• Locations - Caesarea Maritime
• Locations - Tiberias
• Romans