– INTRODUCTION –

THROUGH her great masterwork, The Poem of the Man-God,1the modern mystic Maria Valtorta [1897-1961†], has become increasingly well known and popular in the West, especially among the Catholic laity. Fr. Gabriel Roschini, O.S.M., Mariologist, philosopher and professor at the Lateran Pontifical University, consultor to the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and one of the participating experts at the Second Vatican Council, has declared Valtorta one of the eighteen greatest mystics of all time. In fact, as material for a course which he taught at the 'Marianum' Pontifical Theological Faculty in Rome on the Marian intuitions of the great mystics, Fr. Roschini used both Valtorta's Poem..., as well as her other mystical writings as a basis for his course. Of these latter, Valtorta has bequeathed us several other volumes of writings, currently being translated into English and comprising, like The Poem..., what she attests to be direct Revelations or Dictations from Christ and Mary. Most of these are contained primarily in her "Notebooks" (I Quaderni) for 1943, 1944 and 1945- 50.

2

Now we owe another debt of gratitude to Valtorta's publisher and editor, Emilio Pisani, who has made available another new little book of her Italian writings entitled, Preghiere

3["Prayers"], which appeared for the first time in 1993. In it he has collected under one cover a number of her spontaneous prayers scattered throughout her other writings. Among these, a "Meditation" entitled: "The Hour of Gethsemani" ["L'ora del Getsemani"], not found among Valtorta's other published writings, appeared for the first time in this little Italian collection of her prayers. A premiere English translation of this Meditation was previously made available to Valtorta readers under the title of "The Garden".4

Along with the "The Garden" ("The Hour of Gethsemani"), Pisani also included in this volume of Valtorta's "Prayers" another Meditation Dictated to Valtorta by Christ on the Eucharist, entitled, "Un ora con Gesú" ["An Hour with Jesus"],5 and which originally appeared in the critical edition of Valtorta's "Notebooks".6The text presented here now offers to Valtorta readers a translation of this Eucharistic Meditation given by Christ to Valtorta. The text used as the basis for this translation, however, is that which appears in the critical edition of Valtorta's "Notebooks".

It is fitting that Valtorta's editor should include this moving Meditation of the Eucharistic Christ as a companion piece to that of His Meditation on His Agony in Gethsemani ("The Garden"), since Christ's institution of the Eucharist immediately preceded His Agony on the same night of Holy Thursday, and manifests His Own intentions and love in inventing this means of abiding with His disciples in His Church: "I am with you all days, even unto the consummation of the world."7It is thus also an everlasting Memorial of His loving us "unto the end."

If then the English presentation of this Meditation serves to increase the reverence and reciprocal love of the Master's disciples for His Eucharistic Presence, it will have served its purpose.

A EUCHARISTIC HOUR WITH JESUS

– I –

[June 14, 1944]

JESUS :

"'IF I do not wash you, you will have no part in My Kingdom.'8

Soul whom I love, and all you whom I love, hear Me. It is I Who speak

to you, because I want to pass this Hour with you.

I, Jesus, do not keep you far from My altar even if you come to it with

your soul wounded with sores and maladies, or entwined in the

coiling vines of passions which mortify and shame you in your

spiritual liberty, binding you and giving you into the power of the

flesh and its king: Lucifer.

I am ever Jesus, the Rabbi of Galilee, the One Whom the lepers, the

paralytics, the blind, the possessed, the epileptics called with a loud

voice, saying: 'Son of David, have pity on me.'9 I am ever Jesus, the

Rabbi Who stretches out His Hand to him who is drowning and says to

him: 'Why did you doubt of Me?'10 I am ever Jesus, the Rabbi Who

says to the dead: 'Rise and go.11 I will it. Go forth from your sleep of

death, from your tomb, and walk,'12 and I restore you to Him Who

loves you.

And Who loves you, O My beloved ones? Who loves you with a true

love, a love that is not egotistic, changeable? Who loves you with a

love that is disinterested, not greedy, but its only goal is to give each

of you what it has amassed for you, and to say to you: 'Take it. It is all

yours. All this I have done for you, so that it may be yours and you

may enjoy it'? Who? The Eternal God. And I restore you to Him. To

Him Who loves you.

I do not keep you far from My altar. Because that altar is My cathedra,

My throne, it is the dwelling of the Physician Who heals every ill.

From here I teach you to have faith. From here I, King of Life, give you

Life. From here I bend over your maladies and heal them again with

the breath of My Love.

I do still more, O children. I descend from this altar and come to meet

you. Here am I Who put Myself on the threshold of these houses of

Mine where too few enter, and fewer still enter with sure faith. Here

am I Who, as a Figure of peace, show Myself on your ways where you

pass dejected, poisoned, burned by pain and sorrow, by self-interest,

by hate. See how I stretch My Hands to you, because I see you totter,

weary under the weight of the boulders you have imposed on

yourselves, and which have taken the place of that cross which I had

put into your hand so that it would be a support for you like the staff

for the pilgrim. See how I say to you: 'Enter. Rest. Drink,' because I

see you exhausted, thirsty.

But you do not see Me. You pass Me by, you knock up against Me,

sometimes from ill-will, sometimes from a dimming of your spiritual

sight ; sometimes you look at Me. But you know yourselves to be

dirty, and you dare not come near My Whiteness of the Divine Host.

But this Whiteness knows how to have compassion on you. Know Me

intimately, men, who distrust Me because you do not so know Me.

Hear Me. I wanted to leave the Liberty and Purity which are the

atmosphere of Heaven and descend into this, your prison, into this

impure air, to help you: because I love you. I did still more: I

deprived Myself of My liberty as God and made Myself a slave of

flesh. The Spirit of God enclosed in flesh, the Infinite locked up in a

handful of muscles and bones, subject to hearing the voices of this

flesh for which the cold, the sun, hunger, thirst, fatigue, is pain. I could

have been ignorant of it all. But I wanted to know the torture of man

fallen from his throne of an innocent creature, in order to love you

more.

Still it was not enough for Me. I wanted -- since to have compassion

one needs to suffer that which the other suffers for whom one has

compassion -- I wanted to feel the assault of all your feelings in order

to feel your struggles, and to grasp what a cunning tyranny Satan puts

there in your blood, in order to understand how easy it is to stay

hypnotized by the Serpent if one's eyes are lowered but a single

moment onto his fascinating gaze: by forgetting to live in the light.

For, the serpent lives not in the light. It goes into the shadowy

recesses that seem restful, and are singularly treacherous. For each of

you these shadows have names: a woman, money, power, egoism, the

senses, ambition. They eclipse for you the Light which is God. In the

midst of them is the Serpent: --Satan. They seem a necklace. But it is

his cord for your strangulation. I wanted to know that because I love

you.

Still it was not enough for Me. For Myself, It would have been enough.

But the Justice of the Father could say to His Flesh: 'You triumphed

over the trap. Man-flesh does not know how to triumph like You, now,

and therefore let him be punished because I cannot pardon one who

is filthy.' I took upon Myself your filth. That of the past, that of this

moment, and that of the future. All. More [wretched] was I than Job

immersed in a putrid dunghill to make a veil for his sores.13 When I

was submerged by the sin of the whole world, I would not dare even

to raise My Eyes any more to seek Heaven, and I would groan feeling

the weight upon Me of the Father's Wrath accumulated for ages,

aware of the faults to come. A deluge of faults over the Earth, from its

dawn to its night. A deluge of curses on the Guilty One. On the Host-

Victim of Sin.

O men! More innocent was I than a child whom its mother kisses on

returning from its baptism. And the Almighty was horrified of Me

because I was Sin,14 having taken upon Myself all the sin of the world.

I sweat from disgust. I sweat blood from disgust of this leprosy on Me

Who was the Innocent One. The Blood broke through My veins in My

loathing of this reeking pool in which I was submerged. And to

complete this torture, to squeeze My Blood from My Heart, there was

added the bitterness of being cursed, for in that hour I was not the

Word of God: I was Man. Man. The Guilty.

Could I not understand your humiliation -- I, Who experienced it --

and not love you because you are humiliated? It is for this I love you. I

have only to remember that hour to love you and call you 'Brothers!'.

But it is not enough to call you this so that the Father may call you:

'Sons'. And I want Him to call you that. What kind of brother would I be

if I did not want you with Me in My Father's House?

Here then is why I say to you: 'Come, that I may wash you.' No one is

so filthy that My washing does not cleanse him. No one is so pure as to

have no need of My Bath. Come. This is not water. There are

miraculous springs which heal the sores and maladies of the flesh. But

this is more than those. This Spring gushes from My Breast.

Behold this slashed Heart from Which gushes the Water that washes.

My Blood is the most limpid Water there is in creation. In It, infirmities

and imperfections are canceled. And your soul becomes white and

whole again, worthy of the Kingdom.

Come. Let Me say to you: 'I absolve you!' Open your heart to Me. In it

are the roots of your ills. Let Me enter. Let Me loose your bandages.

Your sores disgust you? Seen in My Light they appear as they are:

swarming with loathsome worms. Do not look at them. Look at Mine.

Let Me work. I have a light Hand. You will feel only a caress...and all

will be healed. You will feel only a kiss and a tear. And all will be

cleaned.

O how beautiful you will be, then, around My altar! Angels amidst the

angels of the Ciborium. And My Heart will have great joy from it.

Because I am the Savior, and I spurn no one. But I am also the Lamb

Who grazes among the lilies,15 and to be surrounded with whiteness

delights Me, because to make each of you white I took life and gave

life.

O how I see the Father smile, and Love make you radiant with His own

radiance, because you are no longer stained with sin!

Come to the Fountain of the Savior.16 My Blood descends upon the

contrite mind and a voice, in which is My own, says: 'I absolve you in

the Name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.'"17

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– I I –

"'One of you will betray Me.'18 One of you! Yes, in a proportion of

one to twelve, one of you betrays Me.

Every betrayal is more painful than being lanced. Look at the

Humanity of your Redeemer. From head to foot is one whole wound.

The scourging horrifies whoever meditates on it and agonizes

whoever experiences it. But it was torture for an hour. You who betray

Me scourge My Heart. For centuries you do it.

I have loved each of you. I love you now. I have compassion for you. I

forgive you. I wash you, taking My own Blood to make of It a purifying

Bath for you. And you betray Me.

I am the Word of God. I am glorious in Heaven. But in this Heaven I

am there not only as Spirit. I am there also as Flesh. The flesh has

feelings and affections. Why do you want to renew for Me,

continually, that gnawing fire which is the nearness of a traitor?

Heaven is distant? No, sons who betray Me. I am near you. I am

among you. And you burn Me with the flame of your betrayal.

I look among the different classes of persons, seeking comfort. And in

each one I meet looks and more looks of traitors. Why do you betray

Me? I am among you to do you good. Why do you want to hurt Me? I

bring You My gifts. Why do you throw at Me biting asps? I call you:

'Friends'.19 Why do you answer Me with: 'Accursed!'? What have I

done to you?20What man do you know who is more patient and good

than I?

Look: when you are happy no one abandons you. But if you weep, if

your riches abandon you, if a sickness makes you contagious, see

how all stay far from you. I remain. Rather, it is just then that I

welcome you, because then you come. You no longer have anyone

with whom to weep and to talk, and then you remember Me. And I do

not say to you: 'Go away, for I do not know you.'21 I could say it,

because in fact, you never came to Me while you were rich, healthy

and happy, to say to Me: 'I am indeed so, and I thank You for it.'

But no. I do not demand even this from anyone who is not already a

giant of love. This 'thanks' I do not demand. It would be enough for Me

should you say to Me: 'I am happy.' Say it to Me. Do not consider Me a

stranger to you. Recall that I am there too. Have a thought for this

Jesus. I would say the 'Thanks' for you to God: My Father and yours.

Instead, you never come. And I could say: 'I do not know you.' But, see

how I open My Arms to you and say: 'Come, that we may weep

together.'

Look: I am in the prisons, in the small and humiliating cells, seated on

the very plank-bed of the convict, and I talk to him of a truer liberty

than that which is beyond those four walls, of a liberty which no

longer fears being wounded by faults which should be punished. And

yet that prisoner is one who has betrayed Me, offending My law of

love. Perhaps he has killed. Perhaps he has robbed. But now he calls

Me. Here I am by him. The world despises him. I love him. I called

'friend' him who killed Me and robbed Me of My life.22 I can call

'friend' this unhappy man who returns to Me.

I, Flame of Love, am near the sick. Their fevers know My caress, their

sweat My sweatcloth, their weakness My Arm that supports them,

their anguish My Word. And yet many are sick from having betrayed

Me in My law. They have served the flesh. And the flesh, a mad wild

beast, is lost, ruined, and ruins them now, even in life. See too that I

am the only One Who is not weary of their evil, and I watch with them,

and suffer with them, and I smile at their hopes. And, if only the Father

wills it, I change those hopes into reality. But if I see that the decree is

for death, look how I take this brother of Mine -- who trembles before

the mystery of death and calls Me -- and say to him: 'Do not fear. You

believe it is darkness: it is light. You believe it is sorrow: it is joy. Give

Me your hand. I know death. I knew it before you. I know that it is

[but] a moment, and that God supernaturally helps to deaden the

senses so as not to depress the soul in its last struggle. Trust. Look at

Me. Me only... Lo! You see? You have passed the threshold. Come

with Me now, to the Father. Do not fear, not even now. I am with you.

The Father loves whomever I love.'

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They are in deserted houses. Before, their voices were merry. [But

now] death or misery has passed, [and] the survivor wanders around

alone. His friends have fled. His loved ones, distanced by work or by

death. There is a sun in the heavens, but for the survivor all is

darkness. There is peace in the night-air, but for the survivor there is

no rest. And yet, many times in that house was I betrayed: because

creatures were made gods. Creatures were loved idolatrously [thus]

betraying My law. But I enter and come to put a ray of light in the

darkness, to infuse peace where there is a storm. That survivor called

Me... Perhaps absentmindedly..., perhaps without a true will to have

Me. But I go without delay.23

Oh! how I ask only to be with each of you. Every memory of past error

falls away when you call Me: 'Jesus!'.

But do not scourge My Heart! It is already opened and bleeding

profusely. Do not poison Its wound. And to those who have

understood Me in My sorrow of one betrayed, I say: 'One of you will

betray Me.24 Give Me your faithful love for a balm.' And I say it to all.

To the saints, My favorites as God. To sinners, My favorites as Jesus.

Because even sinners, for whom I became Jesus, can treat this wound

for Me.

You are Samaritans? I know it. But My parable speaks of a good

Samaritan who treats the wounds untreated by the sons of the Law

who pass by, absorbed in their hurry to serve God.25 They do not

know that God is served more by loving than by performing

practices.

I am the Wounded Man languishing on your roads. Bandits have

attacked and stripped Me. The Bandits: those who unworthily enjoy

My Sacrifice of a God Who makes Himself flesh. They stripped Me:

denying Me My attributes with their numerous heresies . They strip

the Truth, because that garment entices them, since it is shining. But

they do not know that it shines because it is worn by Him Who is the

Sun, and in the hand of those who cover it with the slobber of their

conceited mind, it becomes some rag. The Truth is truth, and with this

light it illumines everything when it is seen united to God. Separated,

it becomes clamorous language. For, the Truth is Science and

Wisdom. But snatched from God, it becomes chaos.

You treat My wounds, even if [you are] Samaritans. Give Me your oil

and wine: the oil, love; the wine, the contrition of your I, your ego.

Treat My wounds. I do not disdain you. Let that sinful woman who

refreshed My weary Feet talk to you and say if I spurn the sinner.26

But never betray Me again. Go, and sin no more. I forgive all for you if

all in you loves Me. Give Me a sincere kiss. My Cheek burns from the

kisses of traitors. Treat It's burns with the kiss of fidelity."

– I I I –

"'Love one another as I have loved you.' 27

From cradle to Cross. From Bethlehem to mount Olivet, I have loved

each of you.

The cold and the misery of My first night in the world did not prevent

Me from loving you with My Spirit and, though annihilating Myself

even to the point of being unable -- I, the Word -- to say to you: 'I love

you,' I said those words to you with My Spirit, inseparable from that of

the Father and working with Him in tireless activity.

The agony of My last night on Earth did not hinder Me from loving

you. Rather, it touched the highest summits of love. It burned, rather,

in the most living conflagration. It consumed, instead, all that was not

love, even to squeezing out -- along with My disgust for sin and My

sorrow at the Father's abandonment -- the Blood from My veins.

What greater love than that which knows how to love while knowing

that it itself is hated? Thus have I loved each of you.

The first gesture of My Hands: a caress. The last: a benediction. And in

between these two gestures -- the first, born in the pitch darkness of a

winter night, the last, in the splendor of a burning summer morning --

thirty-three years of gestures of love, corresponding to as many

movements of love. Love with miracles, love with caresses of children

and friends, the love of a Master, the love of a Benefactor, the love of a

Friend, love, love, love...

And a more than human love at the last Supper. Before being bound

and impaled, these Hands of Mine washed the feet of the apostles,

even of that one whose heart I had wanted to wash; and they broke

the bread. And I broke My Heart with that bread -- that bread I gave

you. For I knew My return to Heaven was near and I did not want to

leave you alone. Because I knew how easily you forget, and I wanted

you to see yourselves as brothers seated at a single supper-table,

around My Altar-table, so as to say to one another: 'We belong to

Jesus!'

What greater love than that which knows how to love the one who

tortures it? And yet it is thus that I loved each of you. And I knew how

to pray for you while I was dying.

Love one another as I have loved you.28Hate extinguishes the light.

Even a simple grudge dims peace. God is Peace, He is Light, because

God is Love.29 But if you do not love, and love as I have loved you,

you cannot have God.

As I have loved you. Therefore without haughtiness. From this

tabernacle, from this Cross, from this Heart go forth only words of

humility.

I am God and I am your Servant, and I stay here waiting for each of

you to say to Me: 'I hunger' in order to give Myself -- Bread -- to you. I

am God and I expose Myself to your eyes, naked and cursed, on a

piece of wood that was an infamous gibbet. I am God and I implore

you to love My Heart. I implore you. For love of you: because if you

love you do yourselves good. I am God. With or without your love I

am always God. But you, no. Without My Love you are nothing: dust.

I want each of you with Me. I want you Here. I want to make of your

dust a Light of Bliss. I want you not to die, but to live: because I am Life

and I want you to have Life.

Love one another without egoism. It would be an impure love,

destined to die of sickness. Love one another by wanting for the

others more good than what you want for yourselves. It is very

difficult. I know. But you see this Eucharistic Bread? It made the

martyrs. They were creatures like each of you: fearful, weak, even

vice-ridden. This Bread made them heroes.

In the first point I indicated to you My Blood for your purification. In

this third point, in order to make you saints, I show you this Altar-table

and this Bread. From being sinners, the Blood has made you just. The

Bread of the just makes you saints. A bath cleanses but does not

nourish. It refreshes, restores, but does not become flesh in the flesh.

Food, though, becomes blood and flesh: it becomes yourselves. My

Food becomes you yourselves.

Oh! think! Look at a small baby. Today he eats his bread and

tomorrow again, and then tomorrow, and tomorrow and tomorrow.

See how he becomes a man: tall, robust, handsome. Is it his mama

who has made him so? No. His mother conceived him, carried him,

brought him to light, nursed him and loved, loved, loved him. But if,

after his milk, that little one had not had anything else but baths,

kisses and love, he would have perished from starvation. That little

child becomes a man from the adult food that he takes. That man is

such because he daily takes his food.

It is the same for your spiritual 'I'. Nourish it with the true Food which

descends from Heaven and which brings you from Heaven all the

energy to make you manly in Grace. A healthy and strong virility is

always good. See how much easier it is to see a sick man as harsh and

without compassion or patience. My Food will make you healthy and

strong with a virility of spirit, and you will know how to love others

more than yourselves, as I have loved you.

For, look, sons, I have loved you not as one loves himself. But more

than Myself. So much so that I have put Myself to death to save you

from death. If you love thus, you will know God intimately. Do you

know what it means to know God intimately? It means to know the

taste of true Joy, of true Peace, of true Friendship.

Oh! The Friendship, the Peace, the Joy of God! It is a reward promised

to the blessed. But it is already given to him who loves on Earth with

all of himself.

Love, to be true, is not of words. It is of deeds.30 Active as its Source

which is God. Nor does it ever tire of working, not even from the

disappointments which come from its brothers. Poor is that love which

falls like a bird with its wings weakened when an obstacle wounds it!

True love, even if wounded, rises. With talons and beak it climbs up,

if it cannot fly anymore, in order not to lie in the shadow and frost, in

order to be in the sun, medicine of every ill. But as soon as it is

reinvigorated, see how it resumes its flight. And it goes from God to

its brothers, and from these to God: this angelic butterfly which

carries the pollens of the Celestial Gardens to fertilize the earthly

flowers; and it carries to God the perfumes snatched from the

humblest flowers, that He may welcome and bless them.

But woe if it gets far from the sun. The Sun is My Eucharist, because in

It is the Father blessing, the Spirit loving, while I, the Word, work.

Come and take. This is the Food that I ardently ask to be consumed by

you.

– I V –

"'If you remain in Me and My Teaching remains in You, whatever you

ask will be given you.'31

I descend into each of you and make Myself your food. But -- Center

that I am -- I draw you to Myself. You nourish yourselves from Me, but

with more reason I nourish Myself from you. The two hungers are

insatiable and constant. The vine nourishes its shoots. But it is the

shoots which make the vine. The water nourishes the seas, but it is the

seas which nourish the water, rising up again in evaporation in order

to descend anew. Therefore you must remain in Me as I in you.

Separated, it is not I but you who die.

I am Food for the spirit and Food for thought. The spirit is nourished

by the Flesh of a God. The spirit, essence poured out from God,

cannot have any food except from That which is its Matrix.

~ ~ ~

46Now for those who always allow themselves to censure My Words, I

say that if they do not understand, let them study theology. My Words

correspond to what theology teaches.

And as for the phrase that the spirit is the "essence poured out from

God,'-- which will certainly give them trouble -- let them think that the

soul is a 'breath infused from God.' You, when deprived of your souls,

are corpses.

Let them open Genesis. It says: 'The Lord God formed the man with

the mire of the earth and sighed into his face the breath of life.' 32 Let

them not say to Me: 'To give him life.' No. To give life to the wild or

domestic animals, quadrupeds, reptiles, fish, birds that they might

exist, He had no need to 'sigh into their face the vital breath.' He

created them and it sufficed. The breath of God is the soul, the soul-

life. It is the breath of the Spirit of God which becomes a living spirit

in man.

Let them also open the Gospels. And with what do you think I restored

life to the dead? With My Hand? With My Voice? No. By infusing My

Breath which, being of God, was alive, that is: it was spiritual, it was

soul. I would bend over the dead and take them by the hand and

command: 'Rise.' 33 Yes. But that was the exterior and visible form.

While I was bending down, I would breathe the spirit into their face,

the outpouring of My Spirit, and life would return.

And if in the resurrection of Lazarus,34 those who censure what I am

saying should say to me: 'You did not come near Lazarus,' I answer:

'For this one, in this miracle, I invoked the help of the Father and --

learn, o men -- in order to have it without fail, I gave Him thanks

before the miracle for having heard Me: 'Father, I thank You for

having heard Me. I know that You always hear Me. But I say it for the

people who surround Me, so that they may believe that You have sent

Me.' Sure faith, prompt gratitude. Anticipated gratitude, rather: proof

of sure faith. For Lazarus buried in the tomb, beyond the space and

bandages and decay, and at a distance from Me, the living effusion of

God was needed. And his life returns.

But let them also open the Book. In the 3rd Book of Kings,35 Chapter

17. 36 How did the prophet Elias restore life to the son of the widow

of Sarepta? By stretching himself three times over the little dead body

and crying out to God. But also by breathing into the dead boy his

own spirit which his prayer to God had rendered powerful for him

with a vital power. Elias, a prophet, that is a servant of God -- but

neither God nor the Son of God -- had to repeat this prayer and

"infusion" three times. But it is always a breath which he infused. A

spiritual breath. And does not the Book say: 'Do not wish to be like the

animals whose life is in their nostrils?.' 37 Which is to say that this Life

is not in [your] respiration, but in a deep, secret point, and from there

it is diffused throughout the whole body, and from there it can be

poured out in throbbings that rise up again to Heaven: charity toward

God; and, spreading itself over the earth: charity toward one's

neighbor. Therefore: as an essence poured out and infused by God, it

is nourished with the food of God.

And for the other phrase: 'I have asked My own glory for you, rather I

have straightway given it to you...' --a phrase with which My censors

will certainly clash: let them take the Gospel of John and open it there

where My last prayer before the Passion is found.38 It would be

salutary if they would nourish their spirit from it daily and would give

it as broken bread to the flock of My 'little ones' whom I have

entrusted to them.

Less books and tomes, scribes of the 20th century! Rather this, this,

THIS prayer, every word of which opens horizons, founts, treasures of

salvation, because it teaches you love, faith, hope, courage, justice,

prudence and temperance. And if they do not see where these virtues

are in it, they will hardly accept My lesson which shows them these

virtues--

It is love: the fundamental note of My whole prayer.

It is faith: when I ask Heavenly gifts for men.

It is hope: when I speak of those who are not yet sanctified but will be,

because the Father will sanctify them even after I will no longer be an

Evangelizer among men.

It is courage: because I cry out this prayer of Mine, which seems a

hymn of triumph, in the hour in which I know there is prepared that

which is torture for the flesh and the apparent failure of every hope,

faith and love on the part of God and of men and in God and in men.

It is justice: when I ask that those who are not sons of perdition, having

not wanted to follow Satan, 'may be only one thing with the Father and

with Me.' No, he does not perish who does not want to perish. He does

not perish. And for him who does not want to perish there is reserved

friendship and union with God. Because the Father and I are just and

We judge with justice, keeping present the weakness of man and the

circumstances that increase that weakness.

And see how I put prudence in My prayer. I do not say: 'They are

sanctified by Me and there is need of nothing else. I am sure of them.'

No, for I say rather: 'Sanctify them in the truth.' I pray that this

sanctification be never exhausted, to counterbalance the never-

exhausted and detrimental action of your nature goaded by Satan.

Finally, there is temperance when I dare to say: 'I sacrifice Myself

totally and I want men totally.' I should want them. But it would not be

justice, because many do not deserve salvation because of their

marriage with Satan. And then I ask, with temperance, for those who

will be sanctified through having believed and lived according to the

Word which the Father gave Me so that I would give it to them. To

these I give the glory which the Father has given Me. 'And the glory

which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be only

one thing with Us.' 39

Here is the phrase which to them [i.e., His censors] will seem a heresy

of my little John.40 No. I protect her. I clasp her to My Heart, I place

her in the circle of My Arms, this 'little one' who knows how to listen to

Me and understand Me because she loves Me. Here is her strength.

She loves Me and therefore she surpasses you, scholars, who are as

much scholars as you can be: with only the one wing of your science,

because the other [wing] is lacking to you in not having ardent, total

charity; you who are scholars, but who are not loving.

This, My little 'voice', which is like that of a little sparrow that stands

with its wings tensed to follow the flight of the Eagle because it

wished to follow Him to hear His song and to repeat it to its

companions -- since the royal Eagle does not oppress the little

fledgling sparrows, but makes them His friends even in [their]

imprisonment 41 --My little "voice", merits to have her littleness,

which is incapable of heights, drawn behind the course of the royal

Flight to Paradisal heights, and to have the Eagle, under the

protection of His powerful wings, protect her from the kites and petty

hawks,42 and to grant her to be nourished on the solitary cliff with the

little morsels which He breaks up for her. 43 Because the Eagle loves

her.

The Eagle loves her so, this little voice. And therefore He has

rebaptized her "John", 44 since she is defended not only by the Divine

Eagle, but also by the apostolic eagle and learns his song from Ours,

and has peace in the shadow of Our Strength, warmth from the Sun to

which We draw her, food in however much we give her. I defend her:

I and John.

And when the little sparrow will no longer have a voice and will be

silent after its last profession of love, when its little wings are

gathered together upon its heart which has so throbbed with love,

and its eyes are closed -- not by satiety from seeing the Sun, its Sun,45

but because the Sun's ardor will have consumed it, We will take the

little sparrow and bring it with Us, beyond the limits which separate

the human from the suprahuman, and we will place it in the lap of

Mary, at the feet of the throne of God, so that it may reopen its wings,

its mouth and eyes, and fly, sing and see. Fly to the Sun-God. Sing to

the Sun-God. See the Sun-God.

This, for those who 'hate her without reason' as they hated Me. For

those, however, who love Me and love her, I say that I give them this

Holy Hour. I have dictated it for many, but I dedicate it to those who

desired it....46

~ ~ ~

I said I am also Food for thought. Thought is nourished from My Word

which is the Thought of a God. —Your thought! Your intelligence is

what makes you like God, because in your intelligence is memory,

intellect and will, as in your spirit there is a likeness [to God] through

your being spirit, free, immortal.

Your thought, to be capable of remembering, understanding, willing

what is good, must be nourished from My Doctrine. And My Doctrine

recalls to you the benefits and the works of God, who God is, what is

God's due. It makes you understand the good and discern it from evil.

It makes you want to do the good. Without My Doctrine you become

slaves of other [doctrines] which have the name 'doctrine' but are

errors. And like ships without compass and rudder you head toward

shipwreck. You go off course. And then how can you say: 'God has

abandoned me,' when it is you yourselves who have abandoned Him?

Remain in Me.47 If you do not remain in Me, it is a sign that you hate

Me. And My Father hates whoever hates Me, because he who hates

Me hates the Father,48 I being one with the Father.49 Remain in Me.

Make the Father unable to distinguish the vine-shoot from the Vine, so

much is the shoot one with It. Make the Father unable to understand

where I end and you begin, so full is our likeness. Whoever loves

ends up taking on the inflections, expressions and gestures of the

beloved.

I want all of you to be as so many copies of Jesus. And this because I

want you to have whatever you ask -- fused to Me you can only ask

good things -- and thus not have to know a rebuff. And this because I

want you to have more still than what you ask, because the Father

pours out His treasures in a continual flow of love upon His Son. And

whoever is in the Son enjoys this infinite outpouring, which is the love

of God Who takes joy in His Word and Who circulates in Him. Now, I

am the Body and you are the members,50and therefore the Joy which

floods Me and comes from the Father, the Power, the Peace, every

other perfection which circulates in Me is transfused into you, My

faithful, who are part of Me, inseparable here and Beyond.

Come each and ask. Have no fear of asking. You can ask all, because

God can give all. Ask for yourselves and for all. I have taught you. Ask

for those present and for those absent. Ask for those of the past, of the

present, of the future. Ask for this your daily life and for your eternity,

and ask both the first and the second for those whom you love.

Ask, ask, ask. For all. For the good, that God bless them. For the

wicked, that God convert them. Say with Me: 'Father, forgive them.' 51

Ask: for health, for peace in the family, peace in the world, peace for

eternity. Ask for holiness. Yes, this too. God is the Holy One and He is

the Father. Ask Him -- along with the life that maintains you -- for

holiness through the Strength which comes from Him.

Have no fear of asking. Your daily bread and daily blessing. You are

not all body; you are not yet all spirit. Ask for the first and for the

second, and it will be given you.

Do not be afraid of daring too much. I have asked for My Own Glory

for each of you, rather I have absolutely given It to you, so that you

may be like Us Who love you, and that the world may know that you

are children of God.52

Come. In this Heart of Mine is Your Father. Enter, that He may be able

to recognize you and say: 'Let there be a great feast in heaven

because I have found a son whom I loved.'" 53

Valtorta :

"Jesus says: 'I have satisfied you. It is I Who have spoken -- always I. I

wanted My Eucharistic Voice to speak. Have It, each of you, as My

gift. I bless you, Maria, and all those who will listen to It.'"

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

N O T E S

1. Maria Valtorta, The Poem of the Man-God, trans., Nicandro Picozzi and Patrick McLaughlin (Centro Editoriale Valtortiano srl, 1986-1990), 5 Volumes, hardbound, $35.00 U.S. Distributed (among others) by Saint Raphael's Publications Inc., 31 King St. W., Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada, J1H 1N5, and in select bookstores in the U.S. [Note: Beginning with the Summer of 1993, according to Valtorta's publisher, Emilio Pisani, subsequent Italian editions of The Poem... will be published under the title: L'Evangelo Come Mi è Stato

Rivelato ("The Gospel as It was Revealed to Me"). [ --Trans.]

2. Maria Valtorta, I Quaderni Del 1943/...1944/...1945-50 (Edizioni Pisani / Centro Editoriale Valtortiano srl. Via Po 95, I 03036 Isola del Liri FR, Italia, 1985).

3. Maria Valtorta, Preghiere (Edizioni Pisani / Centro Editoriale Valtortiano srl, Viale Piscicelli 89-91, 03036 Isola del Liri, Italia, 1993).

4. Privately translated and posted earlier on this Site in the preceding document [ q.v.]

5. Op. cit., pp.75ff.

6. Valtorta, I Quaderni del 1944, pp.433-444.

7. Matthew 28:20.

8. John 13:8.

9. Luke 18:38.

10. Matthew 14:31.

11. "vai": Thus the reading in the critical edition of the Quaderni. The

unedited edition in Preghiere has "vivi": "live."

12. Mark 5:41; Luke 7:14; 8:54; John 11:43.

13. Job 2:8.

14. cf. 2 Corinthians 5:21.

15. Canticle of Canticles 2:16.

16. cf. Isaiah 12:3.

17. This is the official formula used by the priest in confession when

absolving a penitent of sins.

18. Matthew 26:21, and parallel passages in the other Gospels.

19. John 15:14-15.

20. cf. Micah 6:3.

21. Matthew 25:12.

22. Matthew 26:50.

23. This paragraph seems somewhat disconnected from the

preceding one, as though there is a lacuna, but it follows immediately

after the preceding paragraph also in the critical edition of Valtorta's I

Quaderni del 1944 from which this translation is made. Christ may

here be commenting on the aftermath of an air raid and

bombardment of Valtorta's hometown of Viareggia during the Second

World War -- a harrowing experience she lived through several times

while in the midst of recording some of her Visions and Locutions. [ --

Trans.]

24. Matthew 26:21.

25. Luke 10:30-37.

26. Luke 7:36-50.

27. John 13:34.

28. John 15:12.

29. 1 John 1:5; 4:7,8.

30. 1 John 3:18.

31. cf. John 15:7

32. Genesis 2:7.

33. Matthew 9:25 et alia.

34. John 11:44.

35. Also called 1 Kings in modern versions.

36. Verses 17-24.

37. cf. Ecclesiastes 3:21.

38. John 17.

39. John 17:22.

40. "Little John" is the affectionate epithet or "pet name" Christ gave to

Valtorta and by which He often addresses her or refers to her. This to

indicate that He regards her as a little replica of His beloved Apostle,

John, since she, like St. John, mystically reclines on His Breast to hear

and repeat the words and visions He gives her in The Poem.

Consistent with this analogy, Christ also uses masculine pronouns in

the following sentences of the text to refer to His "little John"

[Valtorta], but since this might confuse English readers, the present

translation substitutes the expected feminine pronouns. Also

consistent with this analogy, future new editions of The Poem will now

be published, significantly, with the title originally intended for the

Work: The Gospel as It was Revealed to Me (cf. Note 1 above). [--

Trans.]

41. A possible allusion to Valtorta's bed-ridden confinement as an

invalid for the last 26 years of her life. [--Trans.]

42. The Italian word for "hawks" here is "falchetti," a diminutive,

probably with the meaning of "small-[minded]," "petty," since the two

birds of prey named here are perhaps a symbolic allusion to

Valtorta's slandering critics (and censors of Christ's words),

elsewhere often called "carping scholars." [--Trans.]

43. "Morsels...breaks up": symbolic allusions to the Visions and

Dictations which Jesus gives to Valtorta and which are only small bits

("morsels") of the great Divine Mysteries which He (the Divine Eagle)

"breaks up" in small pieces for His "little sparrow" (Valtorta) to digest.

[--Trans.]

44. See Note 40 above.

45. We recall here how Valtorta, in her years of psychic isolation

preceding her death, when she had lost her capacity to dialogue and

remained crucified on her sick bed without writing or working

anymore, was accustomed to exclaim at times: "What a sun there is

there!" --according to the testimony of her friend and nurse, Martha

Diciotti.

46. "Now for those...who desired it..." The section between these

marks: "~ ~ ~" , is interpolated here from a subsequent Dictation by

Christ on the following day, June 15th, in which He further comments

on the phrase about the spirit as "Essence poured out from God."

Valtorta introduces it thus: "I re-read today, June 15th, the holy Hour

dictated yesterday, and Jesus says to me:...," and then follows this

interpolated section. (cf. I Quaderni del 1944, pp.444-448). [--Trans.]

47. cf. John 15:4ff.

48. John 15:23.

49. John 10:30; 17:22.

50. cf. 1 Corinthians 6:15.

51. Luke 23:34.

52. cf. John 17:20-23 and 1 John 3:1.

53. cf. Luke 15:22-32.