Responding for a Short Time and Getting Lost

Divine Appeal Reflection - 178

Today, consider in Divine Appeal 178: "Many will respond for a short time but after that they will say to me: I have been faithful to my duties. I need not endure anymore. Afterwards they end up getting lost... Assure them how much they torture Me in the Sacrament of My Love. Mankind treats Me so cruelly. I love them all. I suffer much when I see that all the pains I endured will be so useless for so many souls who are eternally lost."

There is something profoundly frightening in the words “Many will respond for a short time.” The danger described here is not necessarily the danger of a person who never loved God. It is the tragedy of a person who once responded, once prayed sincerely, once sacrificed generously, once desired holiness, but gradually became tired of remaining faithful. The soul may begin with fire and finish with calculation. At first it asks, “What more can I give?” Later it asks, “How much must I still give?” This is the subtle passage from love to spiritual bookkeeping. Israel began its journey through the wilderness after experiencing extraordinary deliverance,(cf. Ex 14:13–31; Num 14:1–4) yet the long road exposed what was hidden beneath its initial enthusiasm . The seed that springs up quickly can still wither when the sun becomes severe because it has no deep root (cf. Mk 4:5–6, 16–17). The mystical danger is therefore not merely falling into some spectacular sin; it is allowing the inner capacity to endure with God to become smaller and smaller. While discreetly negotiating the cost of discipleship, a soul can continue to appear religious. It may go to Mass, say prayers, fulfilll obligations, and maintain a respectable appearance, but on the inside, it draws an invisible line: "I will follow Christ, provided He does not disturb the life I have arranged." The surrender stops precisely where sacrifice begins. Like the rich young man who had kept many commandments yet withdrew when discipleship demanded his possessions, the danger is not always rejection of God but attachment to what we are unwilling to place beneath His lordship (cf. Mk 10:17–22). The soul can serve faithfully while secretly reserving certain rooms of the heart—its comfort, reputation, relationships, money, ambitions, resentments, or private habits—from the searching light of Christ (cf. Lk 14:26–27; CCC 2544–2547). True fidelity begins where negotiation ends. It asks not, “How much can I give without being disturbed?” but, “What is Christ asking me to surrender so that love may become complete?” (cf. Jn 14:15; Rom 12:1). Yet love is revealed precisely when the beloved becomes costly. The Catechism(cf. CCC 162–165; 1814–1816; 2016) teaches that perseverance in charity is indispensable because Christian existence is a continual cooperation with grace . The soul must therefore ask a terrifyingly honest question: Have I remained faithful to Christ, or merely faithful to the version of Christianity that does not require me to die to myself?

The words “I have been faithful to my duties. I need not endure anymore” expose an even deeper spiritual illusion. A duty can be completed while love remains unfinished. A consecrated person may obey on the outside but resist God on the inside; a worker may complete all tasks assigned to them while allowing resentment to consume their heart; a young person may avoid serious sin while progressively losing interest in holiness; a priest may fulfilll his schedule while losing compassion for the wounded.  The older brother in the parable of the merciful father had remained physically near his father's house, yet his heart revealed that service had become an argument for entitlement (cf. Lk 15:25–32). The tragedy is subtle: the soul begins to treat fidelity as something God owes it recognition for. But Christian love does not say, “I have done my part; therefore I am released from love.” Christ's Cross destroys that mentality. At Gethsemane, Jesus did not measure obedience by convenience; He entered the mystery of complete surrender to the Father's will (cf. Lk 22:39–46). The Christian vocation therefore cannot be reduced to completing obligations. The deeper mystery is whether the heart continues consenting to grace when consolation disappears. There are seasons when prayer feels like speaking into silence, forgiveness feels painfully undeserved, chastity demands a sacrifice no one sees, marriage becomes a daily school of dying to self, priesthood carries a loneliness that cannot easily be explained, religious obedience wounds the desire to control, honest work receives no recognition, and hidden service seems to vanish without a trace . However, these times are not disruptions to the spiritual life; rather, they could be its most profound purification. Love loses all rewards except God when sweetness vanishes.  The soul can no longer say, “I remain because this feels beautiful”; it begins to say, “I remain because You are worthy of my fidelity.” This is where perseverance becomes mystical: love passes from emotion into sacrifice, from attraction into surrender, from sentiment into substance (cf. Jn 15:9–10; Lk 9:23). Like Abraham ascending Moriah without knowing how God would provide,(cf. Gen 22:1–14) the faithful soul continues walking because it trusts the One who called it . The purest yes may be spoken when the heart feels no sweetness in saying it. Perseverance is therefore the soul remaining beneath the hidden Face of Christ and whispering through darkness: Even when I cannot feel Your presence, I will not withdraw my yes; even when I cannot understand Your ways, I will remain Yours (cf. Job 13:15; Hab 3:17–18).

Then comes the extraordinarily solemn Eucharistic dimension: “Assure them how much they torture Me in the Sacrament of My Love.” The Eucharist reveals a mystery almost too great for ordinary human imagination: Christ gives Himself entirely while remaining vulnerable to human response. The One who possesses all glory places Himself under the humble sacramental signs of bread and wine, enters churches built by human hands, waits in tabernacles, and allows humanity to approach Him freely . Here is the striking mystery: God's omnipotence does not prevent Him from choosing Eucharistic vulnerability. The Eucharist is divine love consenting to remain accessible even when love is ignored. A tabernacle may stand only metres away from people who are absorbed in everything except Christ. Mass may be celebrated while hearts remain distracted.  A church may be filled with sacred objects while the Sacred Presence is treated as ordinary. The wound is not simply that people fail to understand a doctrine; it is that Love Himself can be present and deliberately disregarded. Yet Christ continues to remain. This is one of the most astonishing aspects of Eucharistic patience. He does not abandon the tabernacle because humanity becomes indifferent. Our Adorable Jesus does not cease loving because His love is not immediately returned. The Eucharist therefore becomes a mirror in which the soul discovers the truth about its own love. Before the Blessed Sacrament, we encounter a Christ who remains, waits, gives, and loves even when He is forgotten; and His silent fidelity asks whether our own love can remain when it receives no applause, gratitude, or emotional reward . One may spend an hour in adoration and still refuse to forgive; one may receive Holy Communion and continue deliberately nurturing dishonesty, hatred, impurity, or injustice. In such a case, the body has approached the altar, but the will has not yet surrendered the sanctuary of the heart . Eucharistic devotion cannot remain separated from Eucharistic conversion. The Christ whom we adore beneath the appearances of bread desires to transform the way we speak, forgive, work, suffer, serve, and love (cf. Jn 6:56–57; Rom 12:1–2). The deepest question is therefore not merely, “Do I receive Jesus?” but, “Am I allowing Jesus to receive my whole life?” For Communion reaches its fullest fruit when the One who enters us gradually becomes the One to whom we surrender everything (cf. Gal 2:20; CCC 1391–1395).

The words “I love them all” stand mysteriously beside the reality of eternal loss. Here we enter one of the deepest tensions of Catholic faith: Divine Mercy is universal in its offer, yet salvation is not imposed upon the human will. God desires the salvation of all , Christ died for all (cf. 2 Cor 5:14–15), and grace continually seeks the human heart; nevertheless, love cannot become coercion without ceasing to be the free response God desires. The mystery of perdition is therefore not that God suddenly stops loving a soul. Rather, the tragedy is that a human being can repeatedly resist grace and progressively become closed to the very Love that seeks to save him (cf. CCC 1033–1037). Pharaoh repeatedly encountered opportunities to yield but repeatedly hardened himself (cf. Ex 8:15, 32; 9:34). The rich man in the Gospel did not necessarily perish because he committed one spectacular act of evil; his tragedy was a heart that could repeatedly see Lazarus and remain unmoved (cf. Lk 16:19–31). This gives us a terrifying insight into ordinary life: eternal choices can be prepared by apparently insignificant daily choices. The soul does not usually abandon God through one dramatic decision; it can drift through a thousand unnoticed permissions.The heart is formed by what it repeatedly welcomes and what it repeatedly refuses. A distraction deliberately entertained, a harsh word left unretracted, a temptation revisited in imagination, a selfish desire protected from correction, a neglected act of charity, or a careless approach to the Eucharistic Presence can slowly make the soul less sensitive to grace . Yet grace also works through what appears almost invisible: choosing silence instead of retaliation, returning to prayer after dryness, seeking reconciliation before pride becomes rigid, refusing dishonest advantage, giving without being thanked, protecting another person's dignity, remaining faithful when nobody notices, and offering God a sacrifice that will never become known . The kingdom of God is often being built in places human eyes never see. A single hidden act of love may possess greater spiritual weight than an impressive action performed for recognition, because God looks upon the heart and not merely the appearance . Nothing is small when love is involved; each decision silently teaches the heart what to love, what to give up, and eventually, who it wants to become. The soul is bent towards something by every decision. Time is not merely carrying us forward; it is forming us for eternity. The heart is slowly becoming what it repeatedly loves, chooses, permits, and surrenders (cf. Mt 6:21; Rom 8:5–6). Therefore perseverance is far more than simply “holding on.” It is the daily cooperation by which grace deepens its dwelling within us. Every day, through hidden choices, we are preparing the heart either to recognize Christ more completely or to become accustomed to living without Him.

Finally, “I suffer much when I see that all the pains I endured will be so useless for so many souls who are eternally lost.” This must be understood with great theological precision: Christ's Passion is never powerless or defective. His sacrifice is complete, unique and sufficient for the salvation of humanity (cf. Heb 9:11–14; 10:10–14; CCC 613–618). Yet the fruits of redemption can be refused by human freedom. Here lies one of the most terrible mysteries of love: God can offer everything without forcing a soul to receive anything. The Cross reveals not only how deeply God loves, but how profoundly He respects the freedom of the one He loves. Our Adorable Jesus stretches His arms toward humanity, offering mercy without forcing the heart to receive it . Divine love invites without coercing, waits without abandoning, and gives without possessing. The Crucified Christ therefore teaches us to love likewise: to guide without controlling, correct without humiliating, forgive without manipulating, and remain faithful while respecting another’s freedom . Grace knocks, enlightens, warns, attracts, strengthens and calls, but the human person must cooperate . This gives extraordinary meaning to every vocation. A mother who patiently corrects a child may never see the fruit of those years. A father who quietly remains faithful to prayer may unknowingly preserve the spiritual memory of his household. A priest may hear a confession whose consequences he will never witness. A teacher may speak one sentence that prevents a young person from surrendering to despair. A religious may spend years in hidden obedience without knowing the souls reached through that fidelity. A sick person offering pain to Christ may become, in silence, an intercessor for people he will never meet. A farmer praying the Rosary while working the soil may offer heaven an apostolate invisible to the world. Nothing offered in love is spiritually insignificant. The Eucharist teaches this logic: Christ gives Himself completely, and the soul is invited to become an extension of that self-giving. Therefore, when we are tempted to say, “I have done enough,” we should remember the tabernacle. Jesus remains. When we are tempted to say, “I cannot forgive anymore,” we should remember Calvary. Jesus continues to give. When we are tempted to say, “My sacrifice accomplishes nothing,” we should remember that hidden love belongs to God even when its fruit remains invisible. The great question of this Appeal is therefore not whether we can endure everything by ourselves. It is whether we will continue allowing Divine Grace to make us faithful after our natural strength has reached its limit. Perseverance is not the strength of a person who never becomes tired; it is the humility of a person who becomes tired and still returns to Grace. It is the soul repeatedly saying, “Jesus, I cannot carry this without You—but with You, I will not abandon love.” (cf. Jn 15:4–5; 2 Cor 12:9; CCC 1996–2001).

Prayer

Our Adorable Jesus, preserve us from beginning well and abandoning You when love becomes costly. Give us perseverance when prayer is dry, duties exhausting, forgiveness difficult and sacrifice hidden. Keep us faithful to Your Eucharistic Heart until death, and make every suffering and offering fruitful for souls who need Your mercy. Amen.

Sr. Anna Ali of the Most Holy Eucharist, intercede for us.