ON THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE DEATH
OF SERVANT OF GOD LUISA PICCARRETA
HAVE you ever wondered why God continually sends the Virgin Mary to appear in the world? Why not the great preacher, St. Paul… or the great evangelist, St. John… or the first pontiff, St. Peter, the “rock”? The reason is because Our Lady is inseparably linked to the Church, both as her spiritual mother and as a “sign”:
A great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. She was with child and wailed aloud in pain as she labored to give birth. (Rev 12:1-2)
This Woman has come to us, in our times, to prepare and assist us for the birthing that is now underway. And who or what is to be born? In a word, it is Jesus, but in us, His Church—and in an all new manner. And it is to culminate through a special outpouring of the Holy Spirit.
God himself had provided to bring about that “new and divine” holiness with which the Holy Spirit wishes to enrich Christians at the dawn of the third millennium, in order to “make Christ the heart of the world.” —POPE JOHN PAUL II, Address to the Rogationist Fathers, n. 6, www.vatican.va
Thus, it is a spiritual birth of the entire People of God so that the “Real Life” of Jesus may dwell within them. Another name for this is the “gift of Living in the Divine Will” as it appears in the revelations to Servant of God Luisa Piccarreta:
Throughout her writings Luisa presents the gift of Living in the Divine Will as a new and divine indwelling in the soul, which she refers to as the “Real Life” of Christ. The Real Life of Christ consists primarily of the soul’s continuous participation in the life of Jesus in the Eucharist. While God may become substantially present in an inanimate host, Luisa affirms that the same may be said of an animate subject, i.e., the human soul. —Rev. Joseph Iannuzzi, The Gift of Living in the Divine Will in the Writings of Luisa Piccarreta (Kindle Locations 2740-2744); (with ecclesiastical approbation from the Pontifical Gregorian University of Rome)
It is, in fact, a complete restoration of mankind in the image and likeness of the Creator—which the Virgin Mary was by virtue of her Immaculate Conception and Living in the Divine Will—by accomplishing in the Church what Jesus accomplished in His humanity.
“All creation,” said St. Paul, “groans and labors up till now,” awaiting Christ’s redemptive efforts to restore the proper relationship between God and his creation. But Christ’s redemptive act did not of itself restore all things, it simply made the work of redemption possible, it began our redemption. Just as all men share in the disobedience of Adam, so all men must share in the obedience of Christ to the Father’s will. Redemption will be complete only when all men share his obedience… —Servant of God Fr. Walter Ciszek, He Leadeth Me (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1995), pp. 116-117
MOTHER’S PRESENCE: AN IMMINENT SIGN
The other day, I tuned into an Evangelical webcast to hear their perspective on the “end times.” At one point, the host declared that Jesus was coming soon to end the 
world and that there would be no symbolic “thousand years” (ie. Era of Peace); that this was all just Jewish myth and fables. And I thought to myself not only how unbiblical his position was but, mostly, how sad. That after laboring for 2000 years, it would be the devil who triumphs in the world, not Christ (Rev 20:2-3). That no, the meek would not inherit the earth (Psalm 37:10-11; Matt 5:5). That the Gospel would not be preached among all the nations before the end (Matt 24:14). That the earth shall not be filled with knowledge of the Lord (Isaiah 11:9). That the nations would not beat their swords into plowshares (Isaiah 2:4). That creation would not be set free and share in the glorious freedom of the children of God (Rom 8:21). That the saints would not reign for a time while Satan is chained and the Antichrist (beast) is deposed (Rev 19:20, 20:1-6). And thus, no, Christ’s Kingdom would not reign “on earth as it is in Heaven” as we have prayed for two millennia (Matt 6:10). According to this pastor’s “eschatology of despair”, the world will just get worse and worse until Jesus cries “uncle!” and throws in the towel.
Oh, how sad! Oh, how wrong! No, my friends, missing from this Protestant perspective is The Marian Dimension of the Storm. The Blessed Mother is the key to understanding the Church’s future because it is within her that is foreshadowed the destiny of the Body of Christ,[1]cf. Fatima, and the Apocalypse and through her maternity, that it is also accomplished. In the words of Pope. St. John XXIII:
We feel that we must disagree with those prophets of doom who are always forecasting disaster, as though the end of the world were at hand. In our times, divine Providence is leading us to a new order of human relations which, by human effort and even beyond all expectations, are directed to the fulfilment of God’s superior and inscrutable designs, in which everything, even human setbacks, leads to the greater good of the Church. —Address for the Opening of the Second Vatican Council, October 11th, 1962
The “greater good” of the Church is to become immaculate like the Immaculata. And this is only possible if the Church, like Mary, is not just doing but Living in the
Divine Will as she did (I explain that difference in The Single Will and True Sonship). Hence, Our Lady is now appearing throughout the world, calling her children into the Upper Room of family and group cenacles in order to prepare them for an outpouring of the Light of the Holy Spirit. This coming “illumination of conscience” or “Warning” will have a dual effect. One will be to liberate the People of God from the interior darkness and power of Satan over their lives — a process that should be well underway in the faithful remnant. The second is to fill them with the initial graces of the Kingdom of the Divine Will.
The Church of the Millennium must have an increased consciousness of being the Kingdom of God in its initial stage. —POPE JOHN PAUL II, L’Osservatore Romano, English Edition, April 25th, 1988
THE EXORCISM… AND DESCENT OF THE KINGDOM
When light comes, it scatters the darkness. The so-called “illumination of conscience” or Warning is just that: an exorcism of the evil that still lingers in the hearts of the faithful and the rest of mankind (though many will not accept this grace).[2]“Out of My infinite Mercy I will provide a mini-judgment. It will be painful, very painful, but short. You will see your sins, you will see how much you offend Me every day. I know that you think this sounds like a very good thing, but unfortunately, even this won’t bring the whole world into My love. Some people will turn even further away from Me, they will be proud and stubborn…. Those who repent will be given an unquenchable thirst for this light… All those who love Me will join to help form the heel that crushes Satan.” —Our Lord to Matthew Kelly, The Miracle of the Illumination of Conscience by Dr. Thomas W. Petrisko, p.96-97 “Why, though…” one priest asked me, “would God grant this grace to only this generation?” Because the Church is in the final stages of her preparation for the Wedding Feast of the Lamb — and she may only attend with a “clean white garment”,[3]cf. Matt 22:12 that is, she must resemble the prototype: the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory. For the wedding day of the Lamb has come, his bride has made herself ready. She was allowed to wear a bright, clean linen garment. (Rev 19;7-8)
But this should not be understood as a mere cleansing of the Church, as if she collectively goes to Confession on the same day. Rather, this interior purity, this “new and
divine holiness” will be the result of the descent of the Kingdom of God that will have cosmic ramifications. The Church will not be made holy because it lives in an Era of Peace; there will be an Era of Peace precisely because the Church has been made holy.
…the Spirit of Pentecost will flood the earth with his power and a great miracle will gain the attention of all humanity. This will be the effect of grace of the Flame of Love… which is Jesus Christ himself… something like this has not happened since the Word became flesh. Satan’s blindness means the universal triumph of My divine Heart, the liberation of souls, and the opening of the way to salvation to its fullest extent. —Jesus to Elizabeth Kindelmann, The Flame of Love, p. 61, 38, 61; 233; from Elizabeth Kindelmann’s diary; 1962; Imprimatur Archbishop Charles Chaput
This new grace, also called “the Flame of Love”, will restore the balance and harmony that was lost in the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve lost the grace of Living in the Divine Will — that source of divine power that sustained all creation in the Divine Life.
…a creation in which God and man, man and woman, humanity and nature are in harmony, in dialogue, in communion. This plan, upset by sin, was taken up in a more wondrous way by Christ, Who is carrying it out mysteriously but effectively in the present reality, in the expectation of bringing it to fulfillment…—POPE JOHN PAUL II, General Audience, February 14, 2001
But as Jesus said to Elizabeth Kindelmann, Satan must first be blinded.[4]Hear Sr. Emmanuel explain an event in the early days of Medjugorje that was a foretaste of the Warning. Watch here. In The Great Day of Light, we see how the “illumination of conscience” is not the end of Satan’s reign, but a certain breaking of his power in millions if not billions of souls. It is the Prodigal Hour when many will return home. As such, this Divine Light of the Holy Spirit will expel much darkness; the Flame of Love will blind Satan; it will be a mass exorcism of the “dragon” unlike anything the world has known such that it will already be the beginning of the reign of the Kingdom of the Divine Will in the hearts of many of His saints. If the “sixth seal” in Revelation 6:12-17 seems to describe the physical realm during the Warning,[5]cf. The Great Day of Light Revelation 12 appears to reveal the spiritual.
Then war broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels battled against the dragon. The dragon and its angels fought back, but they did not prevail and there was no longer any place for them in heaven…[6]The term “heaven” likely does not refer to Heaven, where Christ and His saints dwell. The most suitable interpretation of this text is not an account of the original fall and rebellion of Satan, as the context is clearly with regard to the age of those who “bear witness to Jesus” [cf. Rev 12:17]. Rather, “heaven” here refers to a spiritual realm related to the earth, the firmament or heavens (cf. Gen 1:1): “For our struggle is not with flesh and blood but with the principalities, with the powers, with the world rulers of this present darkness, with the evil spirits in the heavens.” [Eph 6:12] Now have salvation and power come, and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Anointed. For the accuser of our brothers is cast out… But woe to you, earth and sea, for the Devil has come down to you in great fury, for he knows he has but a short time…(Rev 12:7-12)
Even though Satan will then focus what’s left of his power in the “beast” or Antichrist in the “short time” he has left (ie. “forty-two months”),[7]cf. Rev. 13:5 St. John 
nonetheless hears the faithful crying out that “the kingdom of our God” has come. How can that be? Because it is an interior manifestation of the Kingdom of the Divine Will—at least in those who were properly disposed for it.[8]cf. Our Lady Prepare – Part II As a sidenote, St. John indicates that the souls who accept the graces of the Warning may be led to a refuge of some kind during the Antichrist’s reign.[9]cf. The Refuge for Our Times
The woman was given the two wings of the great eagle, so that she could fly to her place in the desert, where, far from the serpent, she was taken care of for a year, two years, and a half-year. (Revelation 12:14)
Modern visionaries have alluded to this sequence of events as well. In the following locution, the late Fr. Stefano Gobbi is given a compressed vision of the Warning and its fruits.
The Holy Spirit will come to establish the glorious reign of Christ and it will be a reign of grace, of holiness, of love, of justice and of peace. With His divine love, He will open the doors of hearts and illuminate all consciences. Every person will see himself in the burning fire of divine truth. It will be like a judgment in miniature. And then Jesus Christ will bring His glorious reign in the world. —Our Lady to Fr. Stefano Gobbi , May 22nd, 1988:
The Canadian mystic, Fr. Michel Rodrigue, explains what he saw in a vision after the Warning, alluding to the infusion of the Gift of Living in the Divine Will within the faithful:
After the time allowed by God for people to return to Jesus, they will have to make a decision: to come back to Him of their free will, or to reject Him. If others reject Him, you will be strengthened in the Holy Spirit. When the angel shows you the flame to follow to the refuge where he wants you to be, you will be strengthened in the Holy Spirit,
and your emotions will be neutralized. Why? Because you will be purified from all the entrance of the darkness. You will have the strength of the Holy Spirit. Your heart will be according to the will of the Father. You will know the will of the Father, and you will know they have chosen the wrong way. You will follow the way that is yours under the guidance of the Lord and the angel of the Lord because He is the way, the life, and the truth. Your heart will be according to the Holy Spirit, Who is the love of Christ, Himself, and the Father, Himself. He will drive you. He will conduct you. You will have no fear. You will just watch them. I saw it. I passed through it… following the Illumination of Conscience, a great gift will be given all of us. The Lord will calm our passions and appease our desires. He will heal us from the distortion of our senses, so after this Pentecost, we will feel that our entire body is in harmony with Him. Standing guard at every refuge will be a holy angel of the Lord who will block anyone from entering who does not have a sign of the cross on their forehead (Rev 7:3). — “The Time of the Refuges”, countdowntothekingdom.com
Jesus explained to Luisa how this “neutralization” of the passions is a fruit of Living in the Divine Will:
Then my Will becomes the life of this soul, in such a way that whatever thing It may dispose over her as well as over others, she is content with everything. Anything seems to be suitable for her; death, life, cross, poverty, etc. — she looks at all of these as her own things, which serve to maintain her life. She reaches such an extent, that not even chastisements frighten her any more, but she is content with the Divine Will in everything… —Book of Heaven, Volume 9, Nov. 1st, 1910
In a word, the coming Illumination will be, at the very least, the final stages of the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart when Our Lady will gather the most possible number of souls to her Son before the world is purified. After all, said Pope Benedict, praying for the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart…
…is equivalent in meaning to our praying for the coming of God’s Kingdom… —Light of the World, p. 166, A Conversation With Peter Seewald
And that is the equivalent of praying for the Holy Spirit to descend and bring to completion the union of the human with the Divine Will, or in other words, the “Real Life” of Jesus in the saints.
That is the way Jesus is always conceived. That is the way He is reproduced in souls. He is always the fruit of heaven and earth. Two artisans must concur in the work that is at once God’s masterpiece and humanity’s supreme product: the Holy Spirit and the most Holy Virgin Mary… for they are the only ones who can reproduce Christ. —Arch. Luis M. Martinez, The Sanctifier, p. 6
Open your hearts and let the Holy Spirit enter, who will transform you and unite you in a single heart with Jesus. —Our Lady to Gisella Cardia, March 3rd, 2021; countdowntothekingdom.com
We are given reason to believe that, towards the end of time and perhaps sooner than we expect, God will raise up people filled with the Holy Spirit and imbued with the spirit of Mary. Through them Mary, Queen most powerful, will work great wonders in the world, destroying sin and setting up the kingdom of Jesus her Son upon the RUINS of the corrupt kingdom, which is this great earthly Babylon. (Rev.18:20) —St. Louis de Montfort, Treatise on True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin,n. 58-59
The approved apparitions in Heede, Germany took place in the 30’s-40’s. In 1959, after an examination of the alleged phenomenon, the Vicariate of the diocese of Osnabrueck, in a circular letter to the clergy of the diocese, confirmed the validity of the apparitions and their supernatural origin.[10]cf. themiraclehunter.com Among them was this message:
As a flash of lighting this Kingdom will come…. Much faster than mankind will realize. I will give them a special light. For some this light will be a blessing; for others, darkness. The light will come like a the star that showed the way to wise men. Mankind will experience My love and My power. I will show them My justice and My mercy. My dearly beloved children, the hour comes closer and closer. Pray without ceasing! —The Miracle of the Illumination of All Consciences, Dr. Thomas W. Petrisko, p. 29
THE KINGDOM IS ETERNAL
This Kingdom of the Divine Will that will be granted to the latter day saints is an eternal kingship, as the prophet Daniel testifies:
They shall be handed over to him [the Antichrist] for a time, two times, and half a time. But when the court is convened, and his dominion is taken away to be abolished and completely destroyed, then the kingship and dominion and majesty of all the kingdoms under the heavens shall be given to the people of the holy ones of the Most High, whose kingship shall be an everlasting kingship, whom all dominions shall serve and obey. (Daniel 7:25-27)
Perhaps this passage, in part, is why the perennial mistake among both Protestant and Catholic scholars has been to claim that the “laweless one”, therefore, must come at the very end of the world (see Antichrist Before the Era of Peace?). But neither the Scriptures nor the Early Church Fathers taught this. Rather, St. John, echoing Daniel, gives borders to this “kingship” within time and history:
The beast was caught and with it the false prophet who had performed in its sight the signs by which he led astray those who had accepted the mark of the beast and those who had worshiped its image. The two were thrown alive into the fiery pool burning with sulfur… Then I saw thrones; those who sat on them were entrusted with judgment. I also saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their witness to Jesus and for the word of God, and who had not worshiped the beast or its image nor had accepted its mark on their foreheads or hands. They came to life and they reigned with Christ for a thousand years. The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were over. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection. The second death has no power over these; they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for [the] thousand years. (Rev 19:20, 20:4-6)
Those who are “beheaded” may be understood in both a literal[11]cf. The Coming Resurrection and a spiritual sense, but ultimately, it refers to those who have died to their human will for the Divine Will. Pope Pius XII describes it as an end of mortal sin in the Church within the boundaries of time:
A new resurrection of Jesus is necessary: a true resurrection, which admits no more lordship of death… In individuals, Christ must destroy the night of mortal sin with the dawn of grace regained. In families, the night of indifference and coolness must give way to the sun of love. In factories, in cities, in nations, in lands of misunderstanding and hatred the night must grow bright as the day, nox sicut dies illuminabitur, and strife will cease and there will be peace. — Urbi et Orbi address,March 2nd, 1957; vatican.va
Jesus echoes this resurrection in His revelations to Luisa:[12]“The resurrection of the dead expected at the end of time already receives its first, decisive realization in spiritual resurrection, the primary objective of the work of salvation. It consists in the new life given by the risen Christ as the fruit of his redemptive work.” —POPE JOHN PAUL II, General Audience, April 22nd, 1998; vatican.va
If I came to earth, it was to enable each and every soul to possess My Resurrection as their own — to give them life and make them resurrect in My own Resurrection. And do you wish to know when the real resurrection of the soul occurs? Not in the end of days, but while it is still alive on earth. One who lives in My Will resurrects to the light and says: ‘My night is over… My will is no longer mine, for it has resurrected in God’s Fiat.’ —Book of Heaven, Volume 36, April 20, 1938
Hence, these souls will not experience the “second death”:
The soul who lives in my Will is not subject to death and receives no Judgment; his life is eternal. All that death had to do, love did in advance, and my Will reordered him completely in Me, so that I have nothing for which to judge him. —Book of Heaven, Volume 11, June 9, 1912
IN SACRED TRADITION
Again, several Church Fathers, based on St. John’s personal testimony, attested to the coming of this Kingdom of the Divine Will after the death of the Antichrist or 
“lawless one” to inaugurate a kind of “sabbath rest” for the Church.
…His Son will come and destroy the time of the lawless one and judge the godless, and change the sun and the moon and the stars—then He shall indeed rest on the seventh day… after giving rest to all things, I will make the beginning of the eighth day, that is, the beginning of another world. —Letter of Barnabas (70-79 A.D.), written by a second century Apostolic Father
So, the blessing foretold undoubtedly refers to the time of His Kingdom, when the just will rule on rising from the dead; when creation, reborn and freed from bondage, will yield an abundance of foods of all kinds from the heaven’s dew and the fertility of the earth, just as the seniors recall. Those who saw John, the Lord’s disciple , [tell us] that they heard from him how the Lord taught and spoke about these times… —St. Irenaeus of Lyons, Church Father (140–202 A.D.); Adversus Haereses, Irenaeus of Lyons, V.33.3.4, The Fathers of the Church, CIMA Publishing Co.; (St. Irenaeus was a student of St. Polycarp, who knew and learned from the Apostle John and was later consecrated bishop of Smyrna by John.)
We do confess that a kingdom is promised to us upon the earth, although before heaven, only in another state of existence; inasmuch as it will be after the resurrection for a thousand years in the divinely-built city of Jerusalem… —Tertullian (155–240 A.D.), Nicene Church Father; Adversus Marcion, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Henrickson Publishers, 1995, Vol. 3, pp. 342-343)
Since God, having finished His works, rested on the seventh day and blessed it, at the end of the six thousandth year all wickedness must be abolished from the earth, and righteousness reign for a thousand years… —Caecilius Firmianus Lactantius (250-317 A.D.; Ecclesiastical writer), The Divine Institutes, Vol 7.
And According to Jesus, we have now arrived at the time when the earth must be purified — “there is really very little time left,” Our Lady said recently.[13]cf. countdowntothekingdom
Every two thousand years I have renewed the world. In the first two thousand years I renewed it with the Deluge; in the second two thousand I renewed it with my coming upon earth when I manifested my Humanity, from which, as if from many fissures, my Divinity shone forth. The good ones and the very Saints of the following two thousand years have lived from the fruits of my Humanity and, in drops, they have enjoyed my Divinity. Now we are around the third two thousand years, and there will be a third renewal. This is the reason for the general confusion: it is nothing other than the preparation of the third
renewal. If in the second renewal I manifested what my Humanity did and suffered, and very little of what my Divinity was operating, now, in this third renewal, after the earth will be purged and a great part of the current generation destroyed, I will be even more generous with creatures, and I will accomplish the renewal by manifesting what my Divinity did within my Humanity… —Jesus to Luisa Piccarreta, Book of Heaven, Vol. 12, Jan. 29th, 1919
In closing then, I would have to agree with St. Louis de Montfort as opposed to our Protestant friends. The Word of God will be vindicated. Christ will triumph. Creation will be liberated. And the Church will become holy and without blemish[14]cf. Eph 5:27 — all before Christ returns at the very end of time
Your divine commandments are broken, your Gospel is thrown aside, torrents of iniquity flood the whole earth carrying away even your servants… Will everything come to the same end as Sodom and Gomorrah? Will you never break your silence? Will you tolerate all this for ever? Is it not true that your will must be done on earth as it is in heaven? Is it not true that your kingdom must come? Did you not give to some souls, dear to you, a vision of the future renewal of the Church? —St. Louis de Montfort, Prayer for Missionaries, n. 5; www.ewtn.com
The most authoritative view, and the one that appears to be most in harmony with Holy Scripture, is that, after the fall of the Antichrist, the Catholic Church will once again enter upon a period of prosperity and triumph. —The End of the Present World and the Mysteries of the Future Life, Fr. Charles Arminjon (1824-1885), p. 56-58; Sophia Institute Press
What is left for you and I, then, is to prepare with all our hearts for it, and take as many souls with us as we can…
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Footnotes
| ↑1 | cf. Fatima, and the Apocalypse |
|---|---|
| ↑2 | “Out of My infinite Mercy I will provide a mini-judgment. It will be painful, very painful, but short. You will see your sins, you will see how much you offend Me every day. I know that you think this sounds like a very good thing, but unfortunately, even this won’t bring the whole world into My love. Some people will turn even further away from Me, they will be proud and stubborn…. Those who repent will be given an unquenchable thirst for this light… All those who love Me will join to help form the heel that crushes Satan.” —Our Lord to Matthew Kelly, The Miracle of the Illumination of Conscience by Dr. Thomas W. Petrisko, p.96-97 |
| ↑3 | cf. Matt 22:12 |
| ↑4 | Hear Sr. Emmanuel explain an event in the early days of Medjugorje that was a foretaste of the Warning. Watch here. |
| ↑5 | cf. The Great Day of Light |
| ↑6 | The term “heaven” likely does not refer to Heaven, where Christ and His saints dwell. The most suitable interpretation of this text is not an account of the original fall and rebellion of Satan, as the context is clearly with regard to the age of those who “bear witness to Jesus” [cf. Rev 12:17]. Rather, “heaven” here refers to a spiritual realm related to the earth, the firmament or heavens (cf. Gen 1:1): “For our struggle is not with flesh and blood but with the principalities, with the powers, with the world rulers of this present darkness, with the evil spirits in the heavens.” [Eph 6:12] |
| ↑7 | cf. Rev. 13:5 |
| ↑8 | cf. Our Lady Prepare – Part II |
| ↑9 | cf. The Refuge for Our Times |
| ↑10 | cf. themiraclehunter.com |
| ↑11 | cf. The Coming Resurrection |
| ↑12 | “The resurrection of the dead expected at the end of time already receives its first, decisive realization in spiritual resurrection, the primary objective of the work of salvation. It consists in the new life given by the risen Christ as the fruit of his redemptive work.” —POPE JOHN PAUL II, General Audience, April 22nd, 1998; vatican.va |
| ↑13 | cf. countdowntothekingdom |
| ↑14 | cf. Eph 5:27 |