Notes for this theme
Reading comfort
GRM 203.6 · Volume 3
Say: “Father! Father!”. And never tire repeating this word. Do you not know that every time you say it, Heaven shines because of God’s joy? If you said with true love no other word but that one, you would be saying a prayer pleasing to the Lord.
GRM 203.7 · Volume 3
that I have come to establish. M.V. noted on typewritten copy: “As Jesus revealed the Father” (John 1:18) during his ministry as Master, and in the way He could reveal it to the living, it will still be through the Word, Son of the Father, that the citizens of the Kingdom of God will have knowledge of God.
“May Your Name be held holy”.
Oh! Name, which is holier and sweeter than any other name and which the fear of the guilty taught you to conceal under a different one. No, no longer Adonai. He is God. He is the God Who in an excess of love created Mankind. And Mankind, from now onwards, with lips cleansed by the purification that I am preparing, should call Him by His Name, awaiting to fully comprehend the true meaning of the Incomprehensible One, when the best children of Mankind, united to Him, will rise to the Kingdom that I have come to establish.
GRM 203.8 · Volume 3
“May Your Kingdom come on earth as it is in Heaven”.
Desire its coming with all your strength. If it came, it would be the joy of the earth. The Kingdom of God in hearts, in families, among citizens and nations. Suffer, work, sacrifice yourselves for this Kingdom. Let the earth be a mirror reflecting the life of Heaven in each individual. It will happen. All this will happen one day. Centuries of tears and blood, of errors, persecutions, of darkness relieved by flashes of light radiating from the mystical Light of My Church will precede the moment in which the earth will possess the Kingdom of God. Oh! My Church: although a boat, it will never be sunk, as it is also a cliff unshakeable by breakers and will hold high the Light, My Light, the Light of God. And it will then be like the intense blazing of a star which, having reached the perfection of its existence, disintegrates, an immeasurable flower of the ethereal gardens, to breathe its existence and love at the feet of its Creator, in a rutilant throb. But it will most certainly come. And then there will be the perfect, blessed eternal Kingdom of Heaven.
GRM 203.8 · Volume 3
“May Your Kingdom come on earth as it is in Heaven”. Desire its coming with all your strength. If it came, it would be the joy of the earth. The Kingdom of God in hearts, in families, among citizens and nations. Suffer, work, sacrifice yourselves for this Kingdom. Let the earth be a mirror reflecting the life of Heaven in each individual.
GRM 203.9 · Volume 3
In Heaven, where everything is faultless, God’s will is done. You, children of Heaven, must learn to do what is done in Heaven.
GRM 203.10 · Volume 3
When you are in Heaven, God alone will be your nourishment. Beatitude will be your food.
GRM 203.10 · Volume 3
When you pray the Father, you do not turn to a friend of the earth, but you apply to the Perfect Friend Who is the Father of Heaven. That is why I say to you: “Ask, and it will be given to you, search, and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to you”. For the one who asks will receive, the one who searches always finds, the one who knocks will have the door opened to him.
GRM 203.12 · Volume 3
Pray with humbleness that God may avert temptations from you. Oh! humbleness! To know oneself for what one is! Without losing heart, but to know oneself! Say: “I may give in, even if I do not think I could do it, because I am but an imperfect judge of myself. Therefore, Father, if possible, deliver me from temptations by keeping me so close to You as not to allow the Evil One to harm me”. Because, remember, it is not God Who tempts you to evil things, but it is the Evil One who tempts you. Pray the Father that He may support your weakness so that it may not be led into temptation by the Evil One.
GRM 204.4-8 · Volume 3
Plautina stands up again and says: «I have been thinking a lot… there is so much I would like to know… everything, to be able to judge. But if I may ask, I would like to know how can a faith, Yours, for instance, be built on a ground which You said is devoid of true faith. You said that our beliefs are vain. So we have nothing. How can we achieve something?»
«I will take as an example something that you have. Your temples. Your really beautiful sacred buildings, the only imperfection of which is that they are dedicated to Nothing, can teach you how one can achieve faith and where to place it. Watch. Where are they built? Which place, if at all possible, is chosen for them? How are they built? The place is generally spacious, open and elevated. And when it is not spacious and open, it is made so by demolishing what encumbers and obstructs it. If it is not elevated, they increase its height by means of a stereobate more elevated than the normal three steps used for temples placed on a natural elevation. They are generally surrounded by a sacred enclosure, formed by colonnades and porches inside which are enclosed the trees sacred to the gods, fountains and altars, statues and stelae and are usually preceded by a propylaeum beyond which is the altar where prayers to the deity are said. In front of it there is the place for the sacrifice, because the sacrifice precedes the prayer. Very often, and particularly in the more magnificent ones, a peristyle encircles them with a garland of precious marbles. Inside there is the front vestibule, outside or inside the peristyle, the cell of the deity and the rear vestibule. Marbles, statues, pediments, acroteria and gables, all polished, precious and decorated, make the temple a most noble building also for the coarsest sight. Is it not so?»
«Yes, it is, Master. You have seen and studied them very well» confirms Plautina praising Jesus.
«But we know that He never left Palestine!?» exclaims Quintilian.
«I never left Palestine to go to Rome or Athens. But I am acquainted with Greek and Roman architecture and I was present when the genius of man decorated the Parthenon because I am wherever there is life or a manifestation of life. Wherever a wise man meditates, a sculptor sculptures, a poet writes, a mother sings over a cradle, a man toils in fields, a doctor fights diseases, a living being breathes, an animal lives, a tree vegetates, I am there together with Him from Whom I come. In the rumble of the earthquake or in the peal of thunder, in the light of stars or in flood-tide and ebb-tide, in the flight of eagles or in the buzzing of mosquitoes, I am there with the Most High Creator.»
«So… You… You know everything. Both thoughts and deeds of men?» asks Quintilian again.
«Yes, I do.»
The Romans look at one another amazed.
204.5
There is a long silence then Valeria timidly begs: «Expand on Your idea, Master, so that we may know what to do.»
«Yes. Faith is built as they build the temples of which you are so proud. They make space for the temple, they free it from obstructions, they elevate it.»
«But where is the temple in which one should put faith, the true deity?» asks Plautina.
«Faith, Plautina, is not a deity. It is a virtue. There are no deities in true faith. There is only One and True God.»
«So… He is up there, in His Olympus, all by Himself? And what does He do if He is alone?»
«He is Self-sufficient and takes care of everything in creation. I have just told you that God is also present in the buzzing of a mosquito. He does not get bored, do not worry. He is not a poor man, the master of an immense empire in which he feels he is hated and lives trembling with fear. He is Love and lives loving. His Life is continuous Love. He is Self-sufficient because He is infinite and most powerful, He is Perfection. So numerous are the things created that live because of His continuous will, that He has no time to grow weary. Tedium is the fruit of idleness and vice. In the Heaven of the True God there is neither idleness nor vice. Soon, in addition to angels which now serve Him, He will have a great crowd of just people rejoicing in Him and the crowd will grow greater and greater with the future believers in the True God. »
«Are the angels genii?» asks Lydia.
«No, they are spiritual beings like God Who created them.»
«What are genii, then?»
«As you imagine them, they are falsehood. They do not exist, as you imagine them. But owing to the instinctive need of men to search for the truth, you have also realised that man is not only flesh and that there is something immortal in his perishable body. And that is the consequence of the incentive of the soul, which is alive and present also in heathens, and suffers in them, as it is disappointed in its desires, because it is famished longing for the True God Whom it remembers in the body in which it dwells and which is guided by a pagan mind. And the same applies to towns and nations. And thus you believe, you feel the need to believe in “genii”. And thus you give yourselves an individual genius, a family, a town, a national genius. You have the “genius of Rome”, the “genius of the emperor”. And you worship them as lesser deities. Come to the true faith. You will become acquainted and friendly with your angel, whom you will venerate, but not worship. Only God is worshipped.»
204.6
«You said: “Incentive of the soul which is alive and present also in heathens, and suffers in them because it is disappointed”. But from whom does the soul come?» asks Publius Quintilian.
«From God. He is the Creator.»
«But are we not born of woman through union with man? Also our gods are born thus.»
«Your gods do not exist. They are phantoms of your mind which needs to believe. Because such need is more peremptory than the need to breathe. Also he, who says he does not believe, does believe. He believes in something. The simple statement: “I do not believe in God” presupposes another faith. In oneself, perhaps, or in one’s proud mind. But one always believes. It is like thinking. If you say: “I do not want to think”, or: “I do not believe in God”, by those two simple sentences you prove that you are thinking that you do not want to believe in Him Whom you know to exist and that you do not want to think. With regards to man, to express the concept correctly you must say: “Man, like all animals, is born through the union of male and female. But the soul, that is the thing which distinguishes the animal-man from the animal-brute, comes from God. He creates it as and when a man is procreated, or rather: when he is conceived in a womb and He infuses it in the body which otherwise would be only animal”.»
«And have we got it? We pagans? According to Your fellow-countrymen it would not appear to be so…» says Quintilian ironically.
«Every man born of woman has it.»
«But You said that sin kills it. If so, how can it be alive in us sinners?» asks Plautina.
«You do not sin against faith, because you believe that you are in the Truth. When you become acquainted with the Truth and you persist in your error, then you will commit sin. Likewise, many things which are sinful for Israelites, are not so for you. Because no divine law forbids you. One sins when one consciously rebels against the order given by God and says: “I know that what I am doing is wrong. But I want to do it just the same”. God is just. He cannot punish one who does the wrong thing thinking that he is doing the right one. He punishes those, who being able to tell Good from Evil, choose the latter and persist in it.»
«So we have a soul and it is alive and present in us?»
«Yes, it is so.»
«And it suffers? Do You really think that it remembers God? We do not remember the womb that bore us. We could not tell what its inside was like. If I have understood You correctly, the soul is spiritually born of God. Can it possibly remember Him if our body does not remember the long time it was in a womb?»
«The soul is not material, Plautina. An embryo is. In fact the soul is infused when the foetus is already formed. The soul is, like God, eternal and spiritual. It is eternal from the moment it is created, whereas God is the Most Perfect Eternal Being and thus has no beginning in time and will have no end. The soul[1], the lucid, intelligent, spiritual work of God, does remember. And it suffers, because it longs for God, the True God, from Whom it comes, and it hungers for God. That is why it spurs the torpid body to endeavour to approach God.»
204.7
«So we have a soul as those whom you call “the just people” of your nation have? Exactly the same?»
«No, Plautina. It depends on what you mean. If you mean according to its origin and nature, it is exactly the same as the souls of our saints. But if you refer to its formation, then I say that it is different. And if you mean according to the perfection reached before death, then it may be completely different. But that does not apply to you heathens. Also a son of our people can be completely different from a saint, in future life. A soul is subjected to three phases, The first is creation. The second a new creation. The third is perfection. The first is common to all men. The second is peculiar to just people who through their will elevate their souls to a more complete revival, joining their good deeds to the perfection of God’s work, whereby their souls are spiritually more perfect and form a connection link between the first and third ones. The third is peculiar to the blessed souls, or saints, if you prefer so, who have exceeded by a thousand degrees the initial stage of their souls, a stage suitable to man, and have transformed them into something suitable to rest in God.»
204.8
«How can we make room, clearance and elevation for our souls?»
«By demolishing the useless things you have in your “ego”. Clear it of all wrong knowledge, and with the debris make the elevation for the sovereign temple. A soul is to be carried higher and higher, on the three steps. Oh! you Romans love symbols. Look at the three steps in a symbolic light. They can tell you their names: penance, patience, perseverance. Or: humbility, purity, justice. Or: wisdom, generosity, mercy. Or, finally, the splendid trinomial: faith, hope, charity. Look also at the symbol of the ornate strong enclosure which encircles the area of the temple. You must surround your soul, the queen of the body, the temple of the Eternal Spirit, with a barrier which may protect it without obstructing light or oppressing it with ugly sights. An enclosure that must be safe and free from the love and desire of what is inferior: flesh and blood, and must aim at what is superior: the spirit. The chisel of freedom is your will-power, which will smooth corners, and remove clefts, stains and flaws in the marble of your ego, so that it may be perfect around your souls. And at the same time, the enclosure protecting the temple is to be used by you as a merciful shelter for the more unhappy people who do not know what Charity is. The porches: they are the effusion of love, of piety, of your desire that more people may come to God, and are like the loving arms stretched like a veil over the cradle of an orphan. And beyond the enclosure: the most beautiful and most scented trees are a homage to the Creator. The trees, planted on a soil previously barren and subsequently cultivated, symbolise all kinds of virtues and form the second living flowery enclosure around the sanctuary; and among the trees, that is among the virtues, there are the fountains, a further effusion of love and another purification before approaching the propylaeum near which one must sacrifice one’s carnality and repudiate all forms of lust before ascending the altar. And then you may proceed further, to the altar and lay your offer on it and finally, crossing the vestibule, you may approach the cell, where God is. And what will the cell be like? Abundance of spiritual wealth, because you can never adorn God too much. Have you understood? You asked Me how Faith is built. I said to You: “Following the method used to build temples”. You can see that it is true.»
Plautina, a Roman lady and therefore a pagan, asks what she can build her faith in Jesus on.
- The soul is not raw matter, Plautina. The embryo is. It is so true that the soul is given only when the fetus is already formed INFUSION OF THE SOUL: The embryo, yes, instead of:the fetus, yes, is a correction by Maria Valtorta to the original manuscript, where she inserts: "So true is it that the soul is given when the fetus is already formed". This phrase is present in the 1985 French translation by Felix Sauvage, but has been removed on the grounds that it would contradict other statements in the chapter, but this statement, which is in line with that of St Thomas Aquinas (see below), is confirmed by other statements such as in EMV 118: Man is first of all only an animal embryo, no different from that of a sheep.
The soul is, in the likeness of God, eternal and spiritual. This position was upheld by Saint Thomas Aquinas, Doctor of the Church, in the tradition of Aristotle. He estimated the insufflation time at 40 days (about 6 weeks). Today, as science advances, John Paul II, without deciding on the exact moment of insufflation, reminds us that from the very origin of the embryo, there is a personal definition to be respected (we all come from it). Anthropological study leads us to recognize that, by virtue of the substantial unity of the body with the spirit, the human genome has not only a biological significance; it is the bearer of an anthropological dignity which has its source in the spiritual soul which penetrates and vivifies it"(Address to the members of the Pontifical Academy for Life, February 24 1998 {it}). For his part, St Thomas Aquinas affirmed "The soul pre-exists in the embryo; it is there first nutritive, then sensitive, and finally intellective"(Summa Theologica, Part I, Question 118, from whence comes the soul of Man, Article 2, Answer).
The soul, lucid, intelligent, spiritual, the work of God, remembers this. This has already been discussed above, in EMV 204.5, as well as in EMV 94.7, EMV 121.7, EMV 154.7 (with a note), EMV 157.5, EMV 169.5, EMV 344.7 (in the mouth of a child), EMV 428.4 (with a note), EMV 534.6 (in the mouth of an old man), EMV 554.10, EMV 556.8.
The memory that souls have of God is dealt with more specifically in : EMV 10.9 | EMV 286.7 | EMV 290.9. Furthermore, Mary "was never deprived of the remembrance of God", as we read in EMV 4.6; this is illustrated in EMV 10.8/10 and in the last lines ofEMV 11.4. Mary's soul is also mentioned in EMV 136.6 and EMV 348.9/10.
GRM 204.4-5.8 · Volume 3
Plautina stands up again and says: «I have been thinking a lot… there is so much I would like to know… everything, to be able to judge. But if I may ask, I would like to know how can a faith, Yours, for instance, be built on a ground which You said is devoid of true faith. You said that our beliefs are vain. So we have nothing. How can we achieve something?»
«I will take as an example something that you have. Your temples. Your really beautiful sacred buildings, the only imperfection of which is that they are dedicated to Nothing, can teach you how one can achieve faith and where to place it. Watch. Where are they built? Which place, if at all possible, is chosen for them? How are they built? The place is generally spacious, open and elevated. And when it is not spacious and open, it is made so by demolishing what encumbers and obstructs it. If it is not elevated, they increase its height by means of a stereobate more elevated than the normal three steps used for temples placed on a natural elevation. They are generally surrounded by a sacred enclosure, formed by colonnades and porches inside which are enclosed the trees sacred to the gods, fountains and altars, statues and stelae and are usually preceded by a propylaeum beyond which is the altar where prayers to the deity are said. In front of it there is the place for the sacrifice, because the sacrifice precedes the prayer. Very often, and particularly in the more magnificent ones, a peristyle encircles them with a garland of precious marbles. Inside there is the front vestibule, outside or inside the peristyle, the cell of the deity and the rear vestibule. Marbles, statues, pediments, acroteria and gables, all polished, precious and decorated, make the temple a most noble building also for the coarsest sight. Is it not so?»
«Yes, it is, Master. You have seen and studied them very well» confirms Plautina praising Jesus.
«But we know that He never left Palestine!?» exclaims Quintilian.
«I never left Palestine to go to Rome or Athens. But I am acquainted with Greek and Roman architecture and I was present when the genius of man decorated the Parthenon because I am wherever there is life or a manifestation of life. Wherever a wise man meditates, a sculptor sculptures, a poet writes, a mother sings over a cradle, a man toils in fields, a doctor fights diseases, a living being breathes, an animal lives, a tree vegetates, I am there together with Him from Whom I come. In the rumble of the earthquake or in the peal of thunder, in the light of stars or in flood-tide and ebb-tide, in the flight of eagles or in the buzzing of mosquitoes, I am there with the Most High Creator.»
«So… You… You know everything. Both thoughts and deeds of men?» asks Quintilian again.
«Yes, I do.»
The Romans look at one another amazed.
204.5
There is a long silence then Valeria timidly begs: «Expand on Your idea, Master, so that we may know what to do.»
«Yes. Faith is built as they build the temples of which you are so proud. They make space for the temple, they free it from obstructions, they elevate it.»
«But where is the temple in which one should put faith, the true deity?» asks Plautina.
«Faith, Plautina, is not a deity. It is a virtue. There are no deities in true faith. There is only One and True God.»
(...) 204.8 «How can we make room, clearance and elevation for our souls?»
«By demolishing the useless things you have in your “ego”. Clear it of all wrong knowledge, and with the debris make the elevation for the sovereign temple. A soul is to be carried higher and higher, on the three steps. Oh! you Romans love symbols. Look at the three steps in a symbolic light. They can tell you their names: penance, patience, perseverance. Or: humbility, purity, justice. Or: wisdom, generosity, mercy. Or, finally, the splendid trinomial: faith, hope, charity. Look also at the symbol of the ornate strong enclosure which encircles the area of the temple. You must surround your soul, the queen of the body, the temple of the Eternal Spirit, with a barrier which may protect it without obstructing light or oppressing it with ugly sights. An enclosure that must be safe and free from the love and desire of what is inferior: flesh and blood, and must aim at what is superior: the spirit. The chisel of freedom is your will-power, which will smooth corners, and remove clefts, stains and flaws in the marble of your ego, so that it may be perfect around your souls. And at the same time, the enclosure protecting the temple is to be used by you as a merciful shelter for the more unhappy people who do not know what Charity is. The porches: they are the effusion of love, of piety, of your desire that more people may come to God, and are like the loving arms stretched like a veil over the cradle of an orphan. And beyond the enclosure: the most beautiful and most scented trees are a homage to the Creator. The trees, planted on a soil previously barren and subsequently cultivated, symbolise all kinds of virtues and form the second living flowery enclosure around the sanctuary; and among the trees, that is among the virtues, there are the fountains, a further effusion of love and another purification before approaching the propylaeum near which one must sacrifice one’s carnality and repudiate all forms of lust before ascending the altar. And then you may proceed further, to the altar and lay your offer on it and finally, crossing the vestibule, you may approach the cell, where God is. And what will the cell be like? Abundance of spiritual wealth, because you can never adorn God too much. Have you understood? You asked Me how Faith is built. I said to You: “Following the method used to build temples”. You can see that it is true.»
Plautina, a Roman lady and therefore a pagan, addresses the Master.