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"As I have told you, these latter have issued forth
from the house, which is a sign that they have arisen
from imperfection and arrived at perfection.
"Open the eye of your intellect and see them
running by the Bridge of the doctrine of Christ
crucified, which was their rule, way, and doctrine.
They place none other before the eye of their
intellect than Christ crucified, not the Father, as
they do who are in imperfect love and do not wish to
suffer pain, but only to have the delight which they
find in Me.
"But they, as if drunken with love and burning
with it, have gathered together and ascended the
three steps, which I figured to you as the three
powers of the soul, and also the three actual steps,
figured to you as in the Body of My only Son, Christ
crucified, by which steps the soul, as I told you,
ascended, first climbing to the Feet, with the feet
of the soul's affection, from thence arriving at the
Side, where she found the secret of the Heart and
knew the baptism of water, which has virtue through
the Blood, and where I dispose the soul to receive
grace, uniting and kneading her together in the
Blood.
"Where did the soul know of this her dignity, in
being kneaded and united with the Blood of the Lamb,
receiving the grace in Holy Baptism, in virtue of the
Blood?
"In the Side, where she knew the fire of divine
Charity, and so, if you remember well, My Truth
manifested to you, when you asked, saying: 'Sweet and
Immaculate Lamb, You were dead when Your side was
opened. Why then did You want to be struck and have
Your heart divided?' And He replied to you, telling
you that there was occasion enough for it; but the
principal part of what He said I will tell you. He
said: Because My desire towards the human generation
was ended, and I had finished the actual work of
bearing pain and torment, and yet I had not been able
to show, by finite things, because My love was
infinite, how much more love I had, I wished you to
see the secret of the Heart, showing it to you open,
so that you might see how much more I loved than I
could show you by finite pain.
"I poured from it Blood and Water, to show you the
baptism of water, which is received in virtue of the
Blood. I also showed the baptism of love in two ways,
first in those who are baptized in their blood, shed
for Me, which has virtue through My Blood, even if
they have not been able to have Holy Baptism, and
also in those who are baptized in fire, not being
able to have Holy Baptism, but desiring it with the
affection of love. There is no baptism of fire
without the Blood, because the Blood is steeped in
and kneaded with the fire of Divine charity, because,
through love was It shed.
"There is yet another way by which the soul
receives the baptism of Blood, speaking, as it were,
under a figure, and this way the Divine charity
provided, knowing the infirmity and fragility of man,
through which he offends, not that he is obliged,
through his fragility and infirmity, to commit sin
unless he wish to do so; but, falling, as he will,
into the guilt of mortal sin, by which he loses the
grace which he drew from Holy Baptism in virtue of
the Blood, it was necessary to leave a continual
baptism of Blood. This the Divine charity provided in
the Sacrament of Holy Confession, the soul receiving
the Baptism of Blood, with contrition of heart,
confessing, when able, to My ministers, who hold the
keys of the Blood, sprinkling It, in absolution, upon
the face of the soul.
"But, if the soul be unable to confess, contrition
of heart is sufficient for this baptism, the hand of
My clemency giving you the fruit of this precious
Blood. But if you are able to confess, I wish you to
do so, and if you are able to, and do not, you will
be deprived of the fruit of the Blood. It is true
that, in the last extremity, a man, desiring to
confess and not being able to, will receive the fruit
of this baptism, of which I have been speaking. But
let no one be so mad as so to arrange his deeds,
that, in the hope of receiving it, he puts off
confessing until the last extremity of death, when he
may not be able to do so. In which case, it is not at
all certain that I shall not say to him, in My Divine
Justice: 'You did not remember Me in the time of your
life, when you could, now will I not remember you in
your death.'
"You see then that these Baptisms, which you
should all receive until the last moment, are
continual, and though My works, that is the pains of
the Cross were finite, the fruit of them which you
receive in Baptism, through Me, are infinite. This is
in virtue of the infinite Divine nature, united with
the finite human nature, which human nature endures
pain in Me, the Word, clothed with your humanity. But
because the one nature is steeped in and united with
the other, the Eternal Deity drew to Himself the
pain, which I suffered with so much fire and love.
"And therefore can this operation be called
infinite, not that My pain, neither the actuality of
the body be infinite, nor the pain of the desire that
I had to complete your redemption, because it was
terminated and finished on the Cross, when the Soul
was separated from the Body; but the fruit, which
came out of the pain and desire for your salvation,
is infinite, and therefore you receive it infinitely.
Had it not been infinite, the whole human generation
could not have been restored to grace, neither the
past, the present, nor the future.
"This I manifested in the opening of My Side,
where is found the secret of the Heart, showing that
I loved more than I could show, with finite pain. I
showed to you that My love was infinite. How? By the
Baptism of Blood, united with the fire of My charity,
and by the general baptism, given to Christians, and
to whomsoever will receive it, and by the baptism of
water, united with the Blood and the fire, wherein
the soul is steeped. And, in order to show this, it
was necessary for the Blood to come out of My Side.
Now I have shown you (said My Truth to you) what you
asked of Me."
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