List of points

Another man of faith wrote to me: “When you have to be on your own, you can notice clearly the help of your brothers. Now, when it comes to my mind that I have to put up with everything ‘all alone’, I often think that, if it weren’t for that ‘company we keep from afar’ — the holy Communion of Saints! — I would not be able to preserve this optimism which fills my heart.”

The Communion of Saints: that young engineer understood it well when he told me: “Father, on such a day, at such a time, you were praying for me.”

This is and will always be the first and most fundamental help that we can provide for souls: prayer.

“Pray for me,” I said as I always do. And he answered in amazement: “But is something the matter?”

I had to explain that something is the matter or happens to us all the time; and I added that when prayer is lacking, “more and more weighty things are the matter.”

Through the Communion of Saints you should feel very closely united to your brothers. Defend that holy unity without fear!

—If you were alone, your noble ambitions would be doomed to failure. A sheep on its own is nearly always a lost sheep.

Do not neglect to say, “Jesus, I love you”, and make one spiritual communion, at least, each day, in atonement for all the profanations and sacrileges he suffers because he wants to be with us.

Here is a thought to help you in difficult moments. “The more my faithfulness increases, the better will I be able to contribute to the growth of others in that virtue”. —How good it is to feel supported by each other.