St. Manuel Gonzalez arrived at his first parish assignment and discovered that his parishioners had no interest in attending Mass. The Tabernacle was covered in cobwebs, the altar linens in disarray, and the parish was largely empty on Sundays. St. John Vianney arrived in Ars to find a people who had turned from the Lord. They were leading lives of dissipation. He discovered that his small country parish was in a very similar state to St. Manuel Gonzalez’s. What did these two saintly men do when they discovered that they had no flock and no help? They turned to Christ.
There are times in our lives when we are given missions, whether in the Church, a school, our families, the local community, charity organization, etc., where we discover, much like these two holy men, that we are on our own. We have been entrusted with a difficult situation. We have very little help. The spiritual blocks are tremendous. Many would say the situation is “impossible,” but the saints knew better than to base their progress on worldly measurements.
Both St. John Vianney and St. Manuel Gonzalez started where they needed to. First, they sat down in front of Our Lord’s Real Presence and began to pray. Second, they called on Our Heavenly Mother for help. This is the starting place for any seemingly impossible situation. The wrong thing to do is to think we can pick ourselves up by our bootstraps and fix it ourselves. These situations cannot be fixed by us. The only good we can do is cooperate with grace. To cooperate with grace, we need to be in tune with the promptings of the Holy Spirit through prayer. There is no better place to be in tune with the Holy Spirit than in union with Our Lord’s Real Presence. Where there is one member of the Holy Trinity, there you will find the other two.
Taking our needs and the difficulties we encounter in our ministries to the Lord in the Tabernacle is an act of surrender and trust. This is ultimately what He is seeking from us. He does not want us to see a problem and then try to fix it ourselves. That is to fall into pride. We can’t fix it, but the Lord can. He knows the hearts He wants to reach through us, so only He can lead us down the path that will open people to Him.
St. John Vianney and St. Manuel Gonzalez entrusted themselves and their priestly ministries entirely to Christ. They knew the cobwebs, stained linens, and empty pews reflected the spiritual state of their communities. They began with the hard work of prayer and penance for the sake of their flocks. It is not glorious work in a worldly sense. Many people would have scoffed at their focus on prayer and penance thinking that it would accomplish very little. These two saints knew that there were hardened hearts and demons that could only be moved through prayer and fasting.
These men also physically labored by cleaning up the cobwebs, linens, and getting rid of the grime that had taken over their parishes. They silently committed to the tireless work of loving God by taking on mundane, thankless tasks and providing for flocks that did not yet exist. They were men of deep faith, hope, and charity, so they were able to prepare for the scores of people who would come later. They remained immersed in prayer and service to the Lord on behalf of those future souls.
It is essential for us to see with the eyes of supernatural faith and to hope in Christ’s ultimate victory. It is only supernatural gifts and weapons that will remove the immense obstacles we find in our way. We give up when we forget to trust in the Lord in faith and to hope that He is at work in the difficulties we encounter. We can start to believe that we are alone. This is especially true when we fall into the lie that we are in control.
We are not alone. Christ is always with us. His Mother is always with us. St. Joseph, our guardian angels, and our heavenly friends are always with us in our ministries. Our Blessed Mother helps bind the wounds we carry from the difficulties and rejections we may face. She is the tender Mother who encourages us and shows us how to love Her Son’s Most Sacred Heart more and more each day. She defends us from the onslaught of the enemy.
In those times in our lives when we find ourselves largely alone, it is essential for us to remember that we are not alone. We must turn completely to the Lord in prayer. Long hours spent before His Real Presence are far more efficacious than trying to bring about change that is not in our power. Turning to Our Blessed Mother for guidance will protect us from discouragement and despair when we see so little fruit in the beginning.
St. John Vianney’s and St. Manuel Gonzalez’s examples show us that the most important thing we can do in an impossible situation is bring our needs and the souls we hope to reach to the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist and to rely on Our Heavenly Mother. If we do these two things and persevere in faith, hope, and charity, the Lord will remove the obstacles in our path, and He will begin to change hearts. He ultimately is looking for our constancy and faithfulness.
Let us turn to Him with our whole hearts in loving surrender and trust just as St. John Vianney and St. Manuel Gonzalez did when faced with seemingly impossible situations. The Lord rewarded their prayerful steadfastness by the conversion of tens of thousands of souls. If we do the same, He will use each one of us in the measure He has ordained from all eternity. He will save souls through us.
Jesus, I trust in You.
Photo by Mario Azzi on Unsplash
