Conversion of St. Paul - Jan. 25th

 

Today is the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul. As a great persecutor of Christians, he was responsible for the stoning of St. Stephen.

The conversion of any soul is a great act of God’s mercy. The Lord sees the misery of the person who is need of mercy. By misery, I mean their sins, their way of life, their heading in the opposite direction of heaven. But, out of love, God intervenes. He moves the heart of an individual to follow Jesus. The Lord initiates all conversions by His grace. This can be seen most clearly during Saul’s journey toward Damascus.

Out love for Saul, the Lord shocks him with a blinding light and a voice from heaven by helping him understand, that in every person he has been persecuting, is Jesus. On the road to Damascus, a great light suddenly shone around him. Blinded by the light, he fell to the ground, and a heard a voice saying, “Saul, Saul, Why do you persecute me?” Saul, eventually regained his eyesight, and became baptized. He changed his name to Paul, as a sign of his conversion to Christ. St. Paul went about the whole known world to spread the Good News. He became the apostle to the Gentiles.

The word “conversion” means to turn around and go in a different direction. Jesus helps Saul to turn around from persecuting others and to turn toward being a follower of Jesus, and a proclaimer of the Gospel.

Baptism is a gift of God’s mercy, because it washes away all sin, both original sin and personal sin and even washes away all purgatory time. Paul would eventually offer Mass, hear confessions, anoint the sick, and ordain men to the priesthood and ordain bishops.

Paul who was first a persecutor of Christians becomes an instrument of God’s mercy to bring many to salvation in Jesus Christ.

Don Calloway was a rebellious teen, whose parents were baptist, but never went to church. He got involved in drugs, alcohol and stealing and dropped out of school. While in Japan, he ran away from home and ended up homeless. After getting caught by the local authorities, he was saved by the US military and was taken to one of their bases. It was there he went to Mass for the first time. At the moment of the consecration, he suddenly had infused knowledge about the Catholic faith and wanted to get baptized and become Catholic. His mother had become Catholic, after she divorced her first husband and married a second man. Don Calloway knew was called to become a priest.

St. Paul would later offer Mass, hear Confessions, and anoint the sick. Since, he was an apostles, he was also a bishop and ordained both priests and bishops. Through God's mercy, he, once persecuted Christians, now became an instrument of mercy.

So too, Fr. Don Calloway became an instrument of mercy, offering Mass, hearing Confessions, doing baptisms, anointing the sick. He is now a Marian of the Immaculate Conception, which promotes Divine Mercy.

We are likewise called to conversion. At times, we too are blinded. We sometimes can persecute those around us, by way of our idiosyncrasies, by our sins, and by our faults. We can be blinded by our sinfulness, and how we are burdens to others.

We too are called to be an instrument of God’s mercy in the world. By overlooking the faults of others, forgiving injuries, doing charitable deeds for others, and especially praying for them. May we come to know our own faults and sins, and work to overcome them, so that we can turn away from sin and draw closer to Jesus.

Today, as prepare to receive Jesus in Holy Communion, let us beseech the Lord and His Holy Mother and ask them to help us, to know ourselves. When we receive Jesus in the Eucharist--- in the silence of our heart, we will hear the voice of the Lord, telling us how we need to change our life and hear how He wants to use us to bestow His mercy on those around us.

And we can respond as St. Paul, by having a true conversion of heart, in which we come to know the greatness of God’s love for us, and therefore respond by changing our lives to reflect our understanding, that the way we treat others, is the way, we treat Jesus.