St. Anthony the Abbot Catholic Church

St. Germaine of Pibrac gave a truly inspiring example of what it means to both hear and heed God's voice. She was a French girl from a middle class family who lived in the late 1500s. A childhood illness left her with a crippled hand, and after her mother died when she was quite young, her father remarried. When her stepmother started having children, Germaine began to be treated more like a servant than a family member.

She had to sleep in a cupboard underneath the stairs. And during the day, even though she was only nine years old and had a crippled hand, she was sent out into the fields to watch over the family's small flock of sheep. They just wanted to keep her out of the way, it seemed. But she had a strong faith.

She made a little rosary by tying knots in a string, and she would pray as she watched over the sheep.

As she grew older, she would also gather other children from the village and teach them the catechism. And she never missed Mass. Even if she was out in the fields, as soon as she heard the church bells chime, indicating that Mass was going to start, she would stick her shepherd's staff in the ground, tell her guardian angel to take care of the sheep, and then walk over to the church to attend the Holy Sacrifice. Her guardian angel did a good job; she never lost a sheep. What is even more important, she grew in holiness and happiness, becoming an inspiration and example even for her harsh stepmother. She was so gentle and wise, in fact, that God couldn't wait to get her home to heaven, and she died in her sleep when she was only 22 years old.      She heard the voice of God's love in those church bells, and she heeded what she heard. Praised Be Jesus Christ!

It was hard for the people of the Old Testament to hear and heed God's word. It was also hard for the people of Jesus' home town to do so. If that's the case, we should not be surprised if there are seasons and situations in our own lives when we also find it hard. Our fallen human nature is like spiritual gravity; it's always pulling us toward following the easy path of comfort and self-indulgence, to go with the flow of popular culture.

Today we can ask ourselves: What has God been saying to us that we have been resisting? It may have something to do with a relationship - someone we need to forgive, or ask forgiveness from, for example. It may be bringing some long-hidden sins to the fountain of God's mercy in confession. It may be some part of Church teaching that the world around us disagrees with, and which we have not accepted or tried to understand more deeply. Or it may be an interior nudge from the Holy Spirit to go deeper in our prayer life, to take a step toward our true vocation, or to make a change of direction in some other way that has long been weighing on our hearts.

God's wisdom, power, and goodness are infinite and unbreakable. When He asks us to change, in little ways or big ways, it's always because He loves us and He is drawing us toward spiritual excellence. The residents of Nazareth resisted that draw, that change, and as a result, Jesus "was not able to perform any mighty deed there." Today, let us promise to hear and also to heed  him, every day, so that His mighty deeds will have free rein to work wonders in our lives.