Three Little Shepherds

LAST MONTH I was writing about our Lord as the Good Shepherd. This month, we shall recall three little shepherds who, almost a century ago, were favoured with a message from the blessed Mother of the Good Shepherd. Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta were looking after sheep in the district of Fatima in central Portugal when, on May 13, they saw a Lady in white garments who told them to pray for sinners.

We know the story, I am sure, and I was privileged two years ago to be in Fatima on the occasion of the Holy Father’s pilgrimage there. Only a few years before, the last survivor of those three children had died at the age of nearly a hundred years. What has this to do with St Anthony? Well, of course, our Saint was himself Portuguese, and the second apparition of our Lady took place on his feast day (June 13).

The message of Fatima is that we should pray (especially using the Rosary) for the conversion of sinners. Our Lady asked the little shepherds to make sacrifices for the sake of souls in darkness and in danger of spiritual death. St Anthony, too, in his lifetime was a great preacher of repentance and conversion. He is often remembered as an outspoken opponent of heresy, that is, of false belief (which was very prevalent in his time), but in truth he was far more concerned with bad example and evil behaviour among those loyal to the teaching of the Church.

Why should we care about the salvation of others? Quite simply, because our Lord and our Lady care so much about it. Every soul matters so much to God that he would have died to save even one. The parable of the good shepherd tells of him leaving the ninety-nine to go after just one. We cannot count ourselves true followers of Jesus if we are simply indifferent to the fate of other people.

 

Meaning of hell

 

In his Introduction to Christianity the Holy Father meditates on the meaning of hell. He speaks of a loneliness that love can no longer penetrate. “If there were such a thing as a loneliness that could no longer be penetrated and transformed by the word of another; if a state of abandonment were to arise that was so deep that no ‘You’ could reach into it any more, then we should have real loneliness and dreadfulness, what theology calls ‘hell’.” (p. 300) Such a state could only arise from the utter determination of a soul to shut God out. Yet that state is a possibility. God will pour out His love even to undergoing the Cross, to win our love. Yet He cannot compel our love: it has to be given freely, it can be refused.

 

The advance guard

 

Saint Anthony devoted his life to preaching the Gospel in order to awaken the men and women of his day to the choice each of us must make. He saw even senior churchmen more devoted to money and pleasure than to their vocation. He saw greedy financiers exploiting others by charging exorbitant rates of interest. He saw officers of the State, charged with maintaining peace, resorting to violence. Such evil corrupts those who indulge in it, and it imperils even the souls of its victims, who are provoked and tempted to anger and resentment and despair.

God raised up a ‘little poor man’, Francis of Assisi, to rekindle the fire of love in a world grown cold. Anthony was one of the first to be inspired by his example and to go out appealing for conversion and renewal. Ninety-five years ago, as the Great War was raging and Russia was falling to the Communist Revolution, our Lady saw the sufferings of the poor and the peril to their souls. During the summer of 1917 she recruited not senior clergy or religious, but three children to be the ‘advance guard’ of her army of prayer. God works better through small instruments than through great.

Our Lady herself, Mary of Nazareth, is the prime example of this. Who would have thought that God would choose a mere girl, little more than a child herself, to be the mother of the Messiah? The Wise Men from the East, typifying human wisdom, took it for granted that the King they sought would be found in a king’s palace. In the end, they arrived at Bethlehem, but simple shepherds had got there first! What they found was not a palace full of courtiers, but a poor carpenter and his wife. Anthony in his sermons rejoices in the paradox, the way that God turns our expectations upside down.

 

True happiness

 

However, let us return to our matter: our responsibility to pray for the conversion of sinners. The sins Anthony regularly rebuked were avarice, lust and pride, the temptations of the world, the flesh and the devil. Human beings naturally desire material possessions, a sort of insurance policy against poverty and want. They naturally enjoy bodily pleasures, particularly those of the dining-room and the bed-room. And they are tempted to overvalue their own worth, and put their own interests before those of others – perhaps even to despise others. Unless they turn away from these limited goals, they will not find true happiness. Unless they seek happiness in the Creator who has (as St Augustine says) made us for Himself, so that our hearts find no rest except in Him, they risk falling into that dreadful loneliness of which the Pope warns us – the isolation that is hell.

 

Lost souls

 

Our Lady showed the little shepherds an image of hell: the importance of the vision was not to impart information as to what hell is like, or what individuals may go there. It was to impress upon them, and upon all of us, how concerned God is to save us from it. When we speak of ‘lost souls’, we are thinking of the countless human beings, our brothers and sisters who, spiritually, do not know where they are, where they are going, or how to get there. While they are still on earth, they are within the reach of our love and prayers. Even among the departed, we should always presume that our prayers can help them, never assume that someone is beyond all help. Only God can judge.

This may seem a strange topic for the month of May! But it is our Lady herself who has impressed upon us the need to pray constantly for sinners! “O, my Jesus, forgive us our sins, preserve us from the fires of hell, and lead all souls to heaven, especially those in most need of your mercy.”

CAPT:

[1] Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta were looking after sheep in the district of Fatima when they saw our Lady on May 13

[2] St Anthony devoted his life to preaching the Gospel in order to awaken the men and women of his day to the choice each of us must make

[3] The message of Fatima is that we should pray for the conversion of sinners