Chapter 28

THE COMPANIONSHIP OF THE SAINTS

What more can I gain if I enter the Catholic Church?  I can assure you that you will gain blessings you never dreamed of.  Concerning heaven St. Paul says:  "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into the mind of man to conceive what God hath prepared for those who love Him."  This is, of course, said of heaven.  But in a very true sense Christ has enriched the Church upon earth with such treasures that it is a foretaste of heaven.  For instance, you will gain among other things a real escape from the loneliness of life.  Never more need you feel desolate if friends or relatives abandon you.  Now you will have the personal love and the companionship of Jesus Christ and His Saints to comfort you.  A whole world of new friends will be yours.  

Religion means fundamentally a bonding of man to God.  In the Catholic Church you will experience the perfect binding of man to God that you never felt before.  You will experience this through every hour of your everyday life.  In Catholic countries of old the very greetings of the day were:  God go with you:  Thanks be to God.  God touched, as it were, every action in the life of man.  You will experience this in the warm friendship you will enter into with the close friends of God, men and women like Mary, the Blessed Mother of God, St. Joseph, the foster father of Jesus, the great Apostles Peter and Paul, the gentle St. Francis of Assisi, the magnificent St. Francis Xavier, St. Theresa, the Little Flower of God and a host of others.  The Saints were men and women like you who lived lives of great sanctity while on earth, who now live close to God in heaven.  We know they are only human beings like ourselves, but they were God's great servants while on earth and are now God's great friends in heaven.  We do not worship them, it is true, but we give them reasonable veneration.  In all humility and confidence, we beg them to intercede for us, to give us the help of the protection of their prayers.  Our lonely earthly pilgrimage is less lonely and less earthly because of their friendship.