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YOUR WORLD!



NIHIL OBSTAT:
Fr. M. Mauritius Malloy, O.C.S.O.

Fr. M. Albericus Wulf, O.C.S.O.

Censores

IMPRIMI POTEST:

Fredericus M. Dunne, O.C.S.O.

Abbas, B. M. de Gethsemani

IMPRIMATUR:
Joannes A. Floersh, D.D.

Archiepiscopus Ludovicopolitanus

die 21 Martii, 1940

First Printing 10M

Second Printing 10M

Third Printing 10M

Fourth Printing 10M

Fifth Printing 20M

COPYRIGHT 1940

by the

ABBEY OF GETHSEMANI, INC.



TO

MY SISTER

ELIZABETH M.

WITH

THE PRAYER

THAT “LITTLE AMIE” WILL

ALWAYS SAY

“F I A T”



Foreword

Would that the whole world were Irish!

At least to this extent that they would learn

to say and to mean the prayer that leaps to

Irish lips when the steel of affliction touches

the heart: ‘‘God’s holy will be done!”

That is a prayer that can be compressed

into one word if we use the Latin tongue, and

that one word is the most important word of

all life. It is the one word — “FIAT.”
God Almighty said “FIAT,” and into the

void that was leaped a universe of light. That

was Creation.

A lowly maid said “FIAT,” and down from

the high walls of heaven leaped the Trinity’s

Second Person and God became man. That

was the Incarnation.

A blood-drenched Man said “FIAT,” and

across the infinite chasm that had been gorged

by sin, was flung the drawbridge of Divine

Mercy, and the portcullis dropped by Adam

was lifted by the loving Christ. That was

Redemption.

You and I must say “FIAT,” and that will

be our Salvation.

“FIAT.” It is only a little word that means

“God’s holy will be done.” It is a magic

word, for it brought a world into being, a

God into flesh and unbolted the bars of

heaven.

Learn to say it always, and your whole

world will change!



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 5

Your Letters Are Bleeding My Heart!

Yes, truly bleeding my heart. Some of you
write that you are childless and long, with a

longing inexpressible, to look into eyes that

have been lit from your own, to smile into a

baby-face that has your own mouth, your own

nose and your own dimple. You tell me that
your arms are aching to crush to your heart a

baby-head that is a miniature of yourself.

That is terribly tragic, and it moves my very
soul, but it does not bleed my heart. To learn
that you will never be called “Mother” or

“Dad,” that your house will ever remain a

house and never become a home, is crushing,

and I feel for you with all the virile feeling

in my manhood — but that is not what is
bleeding my heart.

Others of you write me something even
more tragic than childlessness. You have

babies; but baby mouths are empty and you

cannot buy them food. You tell me that
you have held baby-heads within your own

hard hands, looked deeply into innocent eyes,

and wondered, as you half wished that they

had never been born, upon what miseries

these baby-eyes would yet look. You brought

these little ones into life and you want them

to mature; but life and living costs — costs
much; and you are without the down-pay-

ment. To make tragedy more tragic you say

that while the present is bad, the prospects

for the future are worse. Such lines ache my
very being. I feel for you, feel deeply; I

feel for those youngsters — and yet, that is
not what is bleeding my heart.

Those of you that write that Worry’s wand
has flecked with silver the head that was once

all gold and that Anxiety has initialed with

cruel, deep cuttings his name on the brow that



6 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

used to be marble-smooth and fair, strike me
deeply. You say that she sees bills and bills

and bills — and yet, you can find no work.
That pierces, and pierces deeply. To have

aged before your time is tragic, but not near-

ly so tragic, as in your old age, to have lost

your all — that is the tale that many more
of you write.

On and on they come, these letters that are
weighted with woe. Some of you are vic-
tims of injustices that cry to heaven for ven-

geance. When appointments are to be made,
merit is ignored, while money, personal gain

and political advancement weigh heavily with

those who have the power of appointing. You

tell me that real worth and true virtue must
go begging, and I believe you — yet, even
this is not what is bleeding my heart.

For your very real sufferings, you have all

my sympathy, my deep, virile, full-hearted,
whole-souled sympathy. From my cloistered
City of God I give you my heart. I suffer
with the suffering, hunger with the hungry,

am lonely with the childless, lost with the
homeless, anxious with the moneyless and

worried with the jobless. That these very

real sorrows shall pass, I will penance my
body and pray my ceaseless prayer; but my
first petition and my main petition shall be
for what is bleeding my heart.

It is not what you write that bleeds my
heart, it is what I read; not what you have

lost, but what you are losing; not what others

have done and are doing to you, but what

you are doing to yourself.

Let me explain.

You have not caused the failures of which

you write. Most of you have spent and been

spent in your mighty efforts to achieve. You

have strained and sweated and slaved; you



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 7

have sacrificed and suffered and prayed.

Every atom of your energies, every ounce of

your strength, your time, your talents, your

thoughts, every bright hour of the day, and

the dark, dark ones of the night, you have

given in one mad endeavor to breast this
thing they call Depression. And with what
results? — None! You find yourself knocked
over, swamped and swept along by this flood,

whose cause you do not know and whose
fullest extreme you cannot guess. You are
innocent victims, and that is the tragic pity.

I can appreciate your bewilderment. I can

understand your dread desperation. The world

is proving too much for you; its economics
are overwhelming; its present times, tyran-

nical. You are finding life a battle, a bitter
battle against odds that are overpowering.

When you write as you do, it is not the wail
of the weakling; it is rather the desperate

shout of the frenzied and the frightened. I

can understand it all. The outlook is ap-

palling. But what hurts me most and what
actually bleeds my heart is that you do not
try the uplook.

I have viewed and reviewed your situations.

Had you been the causes of them in any way,
we could say that your sufferings were but
retributive justice. But no! you have not been

the causes. You are innocent victims, vic-
tims of the times, the tryanny of dishonest

politicians and cruel injustices. And yet, it
is not the actions of these that are bleeding

my heart — it is your reactions.
Do you know what cuts more deeply than

deep? — You, just you. I am not wounded
because you are inculpably childless, unwill-

ingly jobless, unblamably homeless. I am not
younded because you are without money,

without food, without resources. But I am



8 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

deeply wounded because you are without

clear sight.

Have you read any of Henry Van Dyke?

He wrote “The Story of the Other Wise
Man.” It is a little gem. He also wrote

“The Sad Shepherd,” in which he tells of

the shepherd who, when the others went
“over to Bethlehem to see this thing that

had come to pass,” stayed behind to watch

the fire and tend the sheep. Thus it was

that he failed to see the Light of the World

and meet the Lamb of God. It is a tragic
little tale, for this man missed seeing his
Maker. Do you know that I am afraid that
you are doing the same? — That is what
hurts.

But let us drop fiction and look at fact.

Three hung on crosses on Calvary. Two were
thieves and murderers, the Other was the

Maker of men. In the gathering gloom to-

wards three o’clock, they on the outside

crosses turned to the One in the center. The

thief on the left snarled, sneered and mocked,

for he saw only a man in misery — a sorry
mess of a man, one who had been scourged
and crowned and spit upon, one who was only

a mass of wounds from bleeding head to

spiked feet; and so, with his dying breath,

this thief swore and cursed and made fun of

his Maker. The thief on the right looked,

and beneath that panoply of purple blood,

beneath that welter of wounds that clothed

His nakedness, beneath that thorn-helmeted

head, he saw his God: and by a plea for par-

don, won Paradise.

The difference between Dismas and his

companion is the difference between near-

sightedness and clear vision. The pathos in

the life of “The Sad Shepherd” is that he

missed so glorious an opportunity to see his



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 9

God. The stark tragedy in the death of the

thief on the left is that he failed to pierce

appearances, to look behind the veil and rec-

ognize his Redeemer. These men missed God,
and that is the tragedy of tragedies. I wonder

if you are not enacting it!

Look! My heart is actually bleeding. But
it does not bleed because you are poor —
poverty can be a blessing. My heart does
not bleed because you are suffering — a tor-
rent of suffering wrought our Redemption.

My heart does not bleed because you are in
want; but it does bleed because you are

wanting — wanting in vision, wanting in per-
ception, wanting in keen sight!

Do you know what this lack of vision is do-
ing to you? — It is causing you to kill bees,
thinking them to be wasps; and you are go-

ing to lack honey! It is making you slash at

the bush because it has thorns, forgetting that

it can also have roses! It is inducing you

to call this Depression a curse, when it really
can be one of God’s greatest blessings. It

is leading you to look upon opportunity as a

dread affliction and forcing you to say

“Faugh,” when you could and you should be
saying “Fiat.”

I have admitted all that you have written.

I wonder if you will now admit all that I am
going to write. I have pondered and puzzled

over your difficulties and distresses; I have

taken them to work with me, to prayer with

me, to bed with me. I have searched and

searched, and at last I have found THE solu-
tion. You have asked me to help you; I am
only too anxious to do that. But I am won-
dering if you will help yourself. It was when
I found the solution that my heart bled, for
then I saw what you had been doing. I

admit the injustices; I admit the palpable



10 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

wrongs; I admit the shame of it all, but my
greatest suffering came when I found the
solution for all your sufferings.

Strange, is it not? And yet, you, too, will
grieve if you are honest, truthful and Cath-

olic. Will you think, really think along with

me and see why I say that it is not your
troubles that are trying me, but that it is

you? Will you look inside with wide-open

eyes? Will you look behind and beyond? If

you will, you will find treasures! the solution

to the Depression and to all difficulties! the

one answer to the “Why?” of your every

heartache and headache! If you will be what

I know you can be — completely logical and
sterlingly Catholic — then you will no longer
be lost in making a living, but be found mak-

ing a life! If you will be what I want you to

be — a real, red-blooded, full-blooded, clear-
visioned Christian — you will learn to say
“Fiat” and thus remake your world!

Come! Let us be honest. Let us face the

truth. It may sting, but it will strengthen.
It may smart as iodine does on an open cut;
but, like the iodine, it will purify and pre-

vent a deadly tetanus. Let us look behind and

beyond. Let us look inside and stop merely

gazing at the outside.

Inside . . . Outside: Behind and Beyond

You must pardon my staccato style. I am
so anxious about your vision that I fall into a

monosyllabic abruptness. I will make an effort

to be more controlled, You, however, must

make a generous effort to follow my every
word. This is not only important — it is
eternally important. It means more than

money, it means merit; more than a living,

it means an everlasting life; more than a

home, it means heaven. I am going to be



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 11

very serious, because your soul and mine are

at stake, and a soul's salvation is terrifically

serious. We are not dealing with things mere-
ly of time, we are dealing with things that

mean our eternities; for it is only by what

you and I do with the things that daily affect

or afflict us that we make a success or a
failure of the one and only life we have.

The Depression, childlessness, joblessness,

homelessness, foodlessness — these are the
things that may mean salvation or damnation
for you and for me. The salvation of our

souls and our economic struggles are not

disparate affairs. Religion and earning a liv-

ing are not to be dissociated. Most men give
six days of the week to the pursuit of money

and a part of the seventh to the worship of

God; but this is exactly the unbalanced bud-

geting of time that I mean to balance in your
life by showing you things from the inside

instead of from the outside, by showing you

what is behind all your troubles and beyond

all the causes of your worry.

Let me explain.

I was looking at a stained-glass window
yesterday — from the outside. I found it a
horror. All I could see were strips of lead

patching odd-sized and more oddly shaped

pieces of glass, glass that looked blurred,

blackish and very dirty. I could find no de-

sign, no figure, no art. For quite some time

I stood staring at it, studying its grating

grotesqueness. It was an eyesore; truly, a

mess. Then I went inside. I went inside and
I found — magnificence! Through light and
drifting clouds, a pale paschal moon was
breaking, shedding shadows in an olive grove.

At some distance off in the rear, three

drowsing disciples proved that “the flesh is

weak,” while out in the foreground, flamed



12 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

my Jesus. Robed in the richest and warmest
of reds, flung against a rock, with hands tense

in agonizing prayer, He knelt and lifted a wan
and weary face to a vision that was coming

from a heaven that had hitherto been heed-

less. He was gazing upon an angel, the
Angel of Consolation, who was winging his
white-robed way in anxious adoration to
minister to his God the Chalice of Divine
Comfort which His Father had sent Him be-
cause He had drunk to the dregs the bitter
cup of the world’s miseries and had said,

“Fiat.”

It is the window of our God in Gethsemani

the night He taught us how to suffer and how
to pray. I stood in open-mouthed wonder,

for it was hard to believe that such mag-

nificence could look so mean and messy from

the outside. It was harder still to realize that

the horror of the outside was the background

for such startling beauty. And here is the
lesson it taught me: “We look at the Depres-
sion and all its subsequent evils from the

outside. We look at all afflictions, be they
personal or family, physical or mental, na-

tional or international, only from the outside.”

Come inside now and see what I mean!

Your letters have made me seek what or
who was behind all your woes. You are in-
nocent victims. I wanted to know why; so
I searched and searched, inside and outside,

I looked behind and beyond, and I made a

tremendous discovery.

Do you remember, over a decade ago, when

the stock-market crashed? Every brain with

any economic acumen wanted to know what

or who was behind it all. It was the correct

thing to do. Find what or who is behind

things, and you can usually rectify wrongs

and set all affairs right. Find the tooth that



Say “Fiat" and Remake Your World! 13

is aching and you can get relief. Find the

focus of infection and you can prevent re-

lapse. Find the cause of cancer and you are

on the road to its control if not its absolute

cure. These are undeniable truths. As in

medicine, so also in economics, politics,

plagues, and afflictions of any and all sorts.

Find the one behind them and you have found

the proper party with whom to parley.

I have found the One with whom you are
to deal, for I have found the One behind the

Depression, behind this wholesale unemploy-

ment, behind this international savagery. I

have found the One behind all our social up-

heavals and our universal unrest. I have

found the One behind all your miseries. I

can tell you now why you are involuntarily
childless, inculpably homeless, unblamably

jobless, penniless and foodless. I can tell

you now why your head knows weariness and
your heart knows ache. I can tell you now
why you are in such sorry straits. I have
found the One — but I do not cry, “Eureka!”
as did the Greek; instead, I bow down in
humble adoration and with Didymus say, “My

Lord and my God!”

Do you begin to understand me?

It took me ten years to find out why there
is a Depression. I was slow in the discovery

because I had been looking at it from the

outside and not from the inside; I had been

viewing it economically instead of theological-

ly. I had actually divorced religion from my
workaday, everyday life. I had used prayer,

the Mass and the Sacraments alone with

which to worship God when I should have
been using my trials and afflictions as well.
I had kept my Sunday as the one day on
which to give God His glory when I should
have been using my blue Mondays, my try-



14 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

ing Tuesdays, my Wednesdays, Thursdays,
Fridays and my black Saturdays. I was using
the church as my formal place of worship
and adoration when I could have, and I
should have, been using the whole wide world

with its Russia, its Roosevelt and its rents,

its joblessness, palpable wrongs and crying

injustices. I was using only prayer to get

God when I should have been using my every
pain. I was paganized and decatholicized by

my environment and did not know it. Un-
consciously I was a pragmatic materialist and

not a practical Christian. I was purblind to

the supernatural as I stared and squinted at

the natural. I was not piercing appearances.

I was not looking inside and, hence, I was

never seeing God and, of course, never say-
ing, “Fiat.”

I lost much those years. I wonder if you

are not doing the same.

Now I see from the inside. Now that T
have cloistered myself and locked out the

world, I get the entire world in proper per-

spective, and I have made the startling dis-

covery of what was always staring me in the
face. I have discovered that it is God’s world

and that nothing happens in that world, with

the single exception of sin, but by His sov-

ereign and omnipotent will — either directive,
preventive or positively permissive.

I know that those are big words and would

entail endless explanations; so I give you a

little illustration that will clarify the entire

situation. I show you the One behind and

beyond as I show you the One in the “mix-

ing room.”

Day in and day out, night after night, you

listen to your radio. At times you hear the

velvety voice of a silver-toned tenor; at other

times you listen to the passionate chorus of



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 15

some grand-opera stars; sometimes you are

mightily stirred by the moving magic of a

symphony; or again, you are soothed by the

dulcet strains of some stringed ensemble; All

come to you beautifully blended; artistically

modulated, and expertly proportioned; but

did you ever think of the one behind it all?

Did you ever reflect that it is not upon your

artist at the microphone, nor the maker of

your receiving set, but upon the tiny fingers

of a single man that the ultimate success or
failure of the broadcast depends? One man*

and one man alone, controls the broadcast,
and he is the man in the “mixing-room.” His
fingers are on the dial that controls the

volume, and it is his will, ultimately speak-

ing, that determines what goes out over the

air and the way it goes out.
Do you grasp that? Do you see that with

the tip of his little finger he could give a tiny

turn to the dial which gives more power

and the silver-toned tenor would sound like a

screech-owl, the grand-opera stars like a

rowdy and raucous cheering section and the

symphony, cacophony? Do you not see that
by a flick of this man’s fingers the whole

performance can be cut off? Therefore, it

is ultimately due to his will that you hear

things and hear them the way you do. This
man in the “mixing-room” is not the cause
of the silvery tenor tones. No, your artist is

the cause. But that you should hear those

silvery tones and hear them as silver is due

to the will of the man in the “mixing-room.”
He controls the broadcasts.
At times he tempers and tones down what

the artists in the studio produce, for they

can be too strong; at other times he strength-

ens or steps up what the musicians produce,

for they can be too weak; and at still otheir

times he simply permits things to go along



16 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

as they are. Get this picture and get it clear-

ly. It is eternally important. See that, while

the man in the “mixing-room” does not cause
the sounds, the songs nor the symphony, his

will is the ultimate reason why you hear them
as you do. He can temper, he can change,
he can cut off the various artists; he can

permit their productions to go out as originally

produced, for he is the man at the controls
and the one man in control.
Allowing now for finite limitations and the

limp in every comparison, look upon life as

the Big Broadcast from the universe’s one

grand studio and you will immediately see

that God is the One in the “mixing-room.”

A startling true picture, is it not? Has not
God His omnipotent fingers on the dials of

every man’s existence? Is not every voice

that trembles the ether under His ul-

timate control? Do you not see, then, that
the ultimate reason for the smoothness or the

harshness of the world-wide Big Broadcast is

to be found only in the Will of the One in

the “mixing-room”? I do not say that He
produces the sound; I do not say that He is

the immediate Cause of the song, the shout

or the wail of the world; but I do say, and

you should see, that the reason why you hear
what you hear and in the way you hear it,
is ultimately the Will of the One in the “mix-

ing-room”; for He steps up, tones down or
simply permits. It is man who immediately
produces the sounds, but that you and I

should hear these sounds, and hear them as

we do, is ultimately traceable not to man, but
to the Will of God, be it directive, preventive

or permissive.

If there are strident blasts breaking upon

our ears, if the thunder of war guns shakes

the world, if the mad cacophony of wrangling
dictators fills the air, do you not see that it is



Bay "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 17

only because He permits it? He has His fin-

gers on the dials. If it were not His Will,

directive or permissive, that certain men

should fill the air with shrieks, He has but

to flick His fingers and all is changed.

Why do the melancholy wails of Depression
work their way into the lives of so many mil-

lions? Why is it that upstart dictators rave
and rant, filling the air with bristling screech

and rupturing the song of the world? Why
is it that whole people madly shout, bombs

crash and cannon give forth their deep-

throated roar? You say, “the free will of

man”; and you are right. But behind and

beyond man — what then? That you and I
should hear these things as we do, is that
due to the free will of man, or is it not rather

ultimately due to the permissive Will of the

One in the “mixing-room”? And that is the
most important fact in life!

The parallel is perfect. He, the omnipotent

One, stands in the “mixing-room” of the

whole world’s Big Broadcast and there is

needed only one flick of His all-powerful

Will and the universe’s whole mad perform-
ance ends. That things go the way they do,
then, with dictators yelling here and atheists

ranting there, with war-bugles blowing over

yonder and hushed expectancy obtaining here,

with the world in happy prosperity and in

the next decade moaning a low and mournful

lamentation because of cruel adversity, is due

immediately to the perverse will of man, but

ultimately to the omnipotent and all-wise

Will of God. He allows things to go on the
way they do, and He allows them for a very
good reason. And that is the second most
important fact in life.

I have just given you what I call the two
most important facts in life; the first is that



18 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

nothing happens in this wide world, with the

single exception of sin, but by the Will of

God, directive, positively permissive or pre-

ventive; the second is that God allows, di-

rects or prevents things only for a very good

reason. That is why I can fearlessly say that
the most important word in all the world for

you and for me is “Fiat.” Your salvation and
mine, your sanctification and mine, your

glorification and mine rests on our doing the

Will of God. That is why “Fiat,” meaning:
“Thy Will, O God, be done!” is so everlasting-
ly important for you and for me.

Since God is the One in the “mixing-room,”

since all things are under His ultimate con-

trol, then, no matter what sound comes to me
out of the wide world’s airways — as long
as it is not the shriek of sin — I know it is
due to the Will of God, directive, preventive

or permissive, and I say, “Fiat.” I do not

have to know whether it is directive, pre-

ventive or permissive; the form makes no

difference to me, the fact alone counts! It

is the Will of God, so I say, “Fiat.” I know
that He is God, the All-good, and though the
air be filled with a killing cacophony, I am
sure that He allows it for a good and a wise
purpose, so again I say, “Fiat.” I may not
know what that purpose is; but I am positive
that it is good and that it is wise.

Would I not be a madman to pit my puny
intellect against the will of the all-wise God?

Would I not be an imbecile of a blasphemer

were I to whine against what He sees fit to
allow? God will never hurt me — that I
know. So I try never to hurt Him — I always
say, “Fiat.”

Have you followed me closely? Do you
now begin to see things from the inside as
well as from the outside? Do you begin to



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 19

recognize the One behind and beyond? The

man in the “mixing-room” controls the broad-

cast, so too, does God control the world and

all things in the world, with the single ex-

ception of sin. With this truth firmly grasped

I can speed on. You can see now what is

bleeding my heart, you are not saying, “Fiat.”
You are hurting God, you are hurting me,

you are hurting yourself!

Stop Bleeding Your Own Heart!

Let me now be personal. You are inter-
ested in you, and so am I. So let us talk
about you. Think now, and answer honestly.

Why are you white and not black, nor red,
nor yellow? Why are you of the Twentieth
Century and not of the Twelfth nor of the

First? Why are you in America and not in
Asia, Africa nor Australia? Why are you
living this moment? Is not the ultimate

answer — because God so wills it? Could
He not have put your soul into the body of
a mulatto or of a Mussulman? Could He not
have brought you into being at the time of

the Pharaohs or the Caesars as well as in

this era of dictators and Depression? Could

He not have called you to judgment last year
or last night? Certainly! Then the ultimate

reason why you are you and in your present
plight is not the stars, the stocks, nor the

economic cycle. The ultimate reason is the

sovereign Will of the all-wise God! That

is why you should say, “Fiat.”

What a revelation is contained in that sec-
ond last sentence! The sovereign Will of the
all-wise God. Would that we could fully
realize its truth and beauty! Then “Fiat”
would leap to our lips and we would never
know worry. This is God’s world, and we
are God’s children. That is why everything,



20 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

except sin, happens by His will and for our

good. St. Augustine summed up the whole
situation in a sentence when he said, “There

would be no evil in the world if God could

draw no good from it.” That is why I say
and why I want you to say, “Fiat.”

God! God! God! He is the ultimate reason
of all things except sin. Why are you in-
voluntarily childless? — Ultimately, because
God so wills it. Why are you jobless? —
Ultimately, because God wills it. Why are
you hcmeless, foodless, penniless? — Ulti-
mately, because God so wills it. Does He
will the sins of the clever and crooked inter-

national bankers? Does He will the injustice
of the thieving politicians? Does He will the
hoggishness of the capitalists, the greed and

the gluttony of the stupid, over-producing

industrialists? No! No! No! God wills no
sin! But that you should be affected by what

these men do is the permissive Will of an
all-wise and all-good God. So, say “Fiat.”

Look! You cannot have an oak without an
acorn, can you? You cannot have a child

unless there has been a mother. You cannot

have a creature unless there is a Creator, nor

a world unless there is God. Ultimately, then,

behind and beyond all things is God. There-

fore, if it was not according to the all-wise

Will of the all-good God that your husband

should lose his job, then the particular indi-

vidual who made your husband jobless would
not have had such power. If it was not ac-

cording to the permissive and all-wise plan

of the all-good God that His people in Russia

should suffer, then Stalin and his army of

madmen would long since have been removed.
If it was not according to that same wise Will

that Poland be purged and Austria purified,

then He could call Adolph Hitler to judg-



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 21

ment and the world might be at peace. Re-

member behind the “higher-ups” is the “High-

est-up”; beyond all men is God!

Again I say God! God! God! He is be-

hind all things in this wide, wide world with

the single exception of sin. And He IS the
all-wise and the all-good God. He blows the

sun to splendor and gives the darkness and

the dew; He drops with delicate tenderness

the snowflakes and the rain; He sends us in

May the blossoms which in harvest-time will
be fruit. He lashes the sea to fury and shakes

the very pillars of the world. He scourges,

for He will not be mocked. He purges, for He
is all-pure. He winnows and flails and grinds
and He does all things exceedingly well, for

He is God the all-wise and the All-good. You
— He permits to suffer, but only that you
may be sanctified. Stop looking upon afflic-
tion, then, as a castigation and recognize it as

a means to sanctification, and you will stop

bleeding my heart and your own! Look at
things from the inside. Look to the One be-

hind and beyond! Say “Fiat” and remake

your world!

Let me grow abrupt again. I want to point
this lesson. It means everything to you and

to me. We are members of the Mystical Body
of Christ. But do our eyes ever smart with

tears unshed and are our hearts internally

bled because of what is happening to that

part of our Being which is in Russia? or that

which is in Mexico? Are we seriously af-
fected because our brothers — brothers by
the splashed Blood of Jesus Christ — are
suffering in Hitler’s mad realm? No! What
affects most of us, and affects us most, is the

economic Depression. We have lost money;
therefore, some of us are losing our faith.
We want a job, for that will bring us money,



22 Say "Fiat" and Bemake Your World!

and money means social position, economic

security, freedom from worry and the oppor-

tunity to purchase what we call pleasure.
We pray for employment and get others to
pray. When we do not get what we want
and pray for it, we whine. We do not com-
plain because Christ is suffering in Russia, in

Mexico, in Germany, in our own America.

No! We complain because WE are suffering.
— That is a selfishness which is suicidal.
That is what I call “spiritual insanity.” That

is what I know to be the bleeding of your

own heart. That is forgetting that God is
the Creator and that we are His creatures.
That is forgetting that God is our Father and

we, His little children. That is completely

forgetting that, while suffering may come im-
mediately from men, it is ultimately per-

mitted or directly sent by God and for our

own good.
Concerning prayer, let us be reasonable for

a moment. If we are not all parents, at least,
we have all been children, and we can recall
that children do not get all that they ask for

and crave, even from the kindest and most in-

dulgent of parents. Sometimes baby wants

the moon. She does not get it! Sometimes

she wants a loaded revolver or a straight-

edged razor. Does she get them? Tell me,

are such parents, who refuse these requests,
cruel? Let me tell you that success has been
the razor with which many a man has slashed
his own soul and bled it white — not white
with the whiteness of purity, but white with

the whiteness oi a corpse. Let me tell you
that position has been the loaded revolver

with which many have blown out their spir-
itual brains. And, finally, let me tell you
that you and I are nothing but “children of

a larger growth,” and God is our kind, indul-

gent and loving Parent.



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 23

I hate sulphur and molasses. Every March

I have nightmares in which I see gigantic

tablespoons heaped high with the sickly-sweet

and sticky stuff. I have a mother who loves

me as no one but an infinite God could love

me. And yet, every year when the snows

began to go and the March winds to blow,

she dosed me with that detestable stuff. I
know that she was not unkind!

One Saturday night I saw a surgeon saw

off the two legs of a twelve-year-old boy. All

during the operation this bone-specialist sang;

he sang “The Roses of Picardy/’ At the end

of his work, he put his hand on the head of

the youngster and collapsed in manly sympa-

thy. Was that specialist cruel! I talked with
that twelve-year-old boy Sunday morning

and he was all smiles. He could never have
smiled and I could never have talked to him,

had not the specialist used the surgeon’s saw

on gangrenous limbs. Let me tell you that
gold is gangrenous! When God permits it to
be taken from some people, He is helping to
save their eternal lives.

Remember St. Augustine, “God would nev-
er permit what we call evil unless He and
we could draw some good from it!” Do you
now see why I plead with you to stop bleeding
your own heart? Do you see why I want you
to look behind and beyond? Do you see why I
say that you have been looking at things

from the outside? View the Depression from
without, and we will call it a curse. Look at
it from within, and we see that it can be a
blessing. Stop looking at what it takes, and

begin to see what it can give. Forget that it
hurts, pinches and pauperizes, and realize

that it can purge and purify, that it can

scourge and sanctify, it can help save your

soul, and then God you will glorify. See in



24 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

it God’s Will, directive, preventive or per-

missive, and say and live “Fiat.”

Do you know that the Depression reminds
me very much of the purple drapes that we
place over our statues during Lent? To the

unknowing they are unsightly things; but I

can kneel before them and pray, for I know
that behind that purple drape is the beauti-

ful figure of my all-beautiful God. So, too,
with the Depression. It is dark and repul-

sive, bitter and vexatious, grim and appalling;

but I know that behind it all is the all-wise
Will of my all-good God, and hence, I say,
“Fiat.”

Let me insist that, while the Depression
may take much from you economically, phys-
ically and mentally, it can give you much
spiritually; and when the long total of life

is finally read, one thing, and one thing alone,

counts — spiritualities! So, stop bleeding
your own heart. Open your eyes and see;
see that nothing happens, either rapturous or

revolting, but by the Will, directive or permis-

sive, of Him who loves you with an everlast-
ing love. You are His child, and He is your
Father, and no really good father hurts a

child for the hurt.

We make a profession of faith by a “Cre-
do” in which we say, “I believe in God, the
Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and

earth and all things.” Let us live that “Cre-

do”! We say the “Our Father,” and one of
its striking petitions is “Thy Will be done.”

Let us mean our prayer! From the light of

reason and the light of faith, we know that
God did make all things and that God rules

all things. Let us live according to our lights!

This is not Hitler’s world, nor Stalin’s world,

nor Roosevelt’s world; it is not the world of

the atheist, the communist, nor the material-



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 25

ist; not the world of the capitalist, the union-

ist, nor the humanist. It is God’s world! And

just as He it is Who will flame the east in a
pageantry unpaintable as tonight’s stars fade,

so it is He Who permits the ache in your
human heart, allows tears to flood your

troubled eyes, permits your golden hair to

silver and traces of Anxiety’s deep tracks

to furrow your young and worried brow.

These things are really gifts, gifts from a

good God, to aid you on to glory. Use them

as such! Make out of these things, which are

very real weights, wings; and then soar •

—

soar to the God who gave you life, sustains
you in life and will take you in death, if

you but clear your vision, stop bleeding your

own heart and make mines out of your moun-

tains and molehills by saying and living a

heart-sincere “Fiat.”

Do understand me. I am NOT trying to
give a solution to the problem of evil. That

is a mystery whose depths we shall never
plumb until we see God “face to face.” But
I AM giving you THE SOLUTION for your
miseries! I am giving you a practical way,
a prudent way, a Catholic way, the Christ-

like way to meet your very real afflictions.
It calls for faith, I know; but it calls more

loudly for reason! Faith is always based on

reason, and my reasoning is as straight as
this:

God, Who is all-good, rules the world.

God, Who is all-wise loves you.

Nothing, except sin, happens but by the

Will of the all-good and all-wise God.

Therefore, all things that come to you, ul-

timately come from your all-loving God and
are meant for your good. That is clear. That
is logical, That is true. But what have you

been doing? — Looking at the ouside and not



26 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

at the inside; seeing only the natural; forget-

ting the One behind and beyond. That is why
my heart has been bleeding. — Not for what
you have lost, but for what you are losing.

That is why I say you are actually bleeding
your own heart.

To bring my message out of the seemingly
pious and platitudinous — I say directly that
you have not been mining your miseries. I

may sound sharp and a trifle harsh, but, do
understand me! I am trying to help. Your
life here and, to a great extent, hereafter,

depends on how you handle trouble. There is
only one way that is rational. There is only

one way that is Catholic and Christian. And
that one way is — “FIAT.”

Say, “Fiat,” and you remake your world!

Say, “Fiat,” and you make mines out of your

mountains and molehills.

Molehills — Mountains and Mines
Most people make mountains out of mole-

hills, but God’s people make mines out of

mountain and molehill by making them

mines!

Understand me, I am not saying that your
troubles are trifles. Far from it! They are

staggeringly tremendous. To stare poverty in

the face is not a trifle. To meet failure on

every street and at every single door, is not a

trifle. To be willing and anxious and craving

to work, and yet find no one to hire you, is

far from being a trifle. Your difficulties are

mountainous, and for them I have heart-deep

sympathy. But what hurts me and has hurt
you is your neglect to make mines out of the

very real mountains of your miseries by min-

ing them. Every one of them is loaded with

ore; ore that is precious beyond price; but



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 27

you are leaving it all deeply buried by your

neglect to look deeply and think clearly.

Gome! Let us think together. It will pay

tremendous dividends.

America needs eleven million jobs. That,

I am the first to admit, and for that I daily
pray. But America has a much more vital

need than eleven million jobs. What America

very especially needs is eleven million Jobs!

Men and women who will sit on the dung-
heap thrown up by our mad materialism, and
with perfect calm, _ scrape off the sores in-

flicted by a greedy, grasping, piggish group

of money-maniacs; men and women who,
though robbed of material riches, are million-

aires in peace,- patience, piety, in fortitude,

fear and love of the Lord; men and women
who can see their savings swallowed up in a
bank’s crash, their homes denuded, them-

selves reduced to want and beggary, and yet

say, with masterly composure and sterling

sincerity, “The Lord has given. The Lord

has taken away.” So far they are only being

logical; but when they add the prayer of all
prayers, they are being loving. When they
adoringly say, “Blessed be the name of the
Lord,” then they have pushed logic to its

logical length and have become mystics. Such

men and women are making mines out of
mountains and molehills; such men and wom-
en are sages and saints; such men and women
have sight — and such, you and I must be, if
you and I would live the life of all living;

for conformity to the Will of God is man’s
greatest act of adoration; and to adore, man
was made.

All of which reminds me that your most
priceless possession is your penny catechism.

For therein you will find a logic for which

you will look in vain in all the world’s phi-

losophies; therein you will find a truth and a



28 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

beauty that the literature of all the lands

has not compassed, nor the libraries of the

world contained. That is your textbook of

all textbooks for it contains what was taught

by the Teacher of all teachers. Therein you

have reason at its deepest depths and revela-

tion in all its sublimity. And if you would
live life, you must translate those lessons in-

to the diction of every deed.

Long years ago you learned the questions

and answers; today you must live them. And
the most thrilling truth that the little book

tells is that you and I were made by God. I

swell with just pride and exaltation when I

think of that. I am no wage-slave. I am no
beast of burden. I am no mere machine. I
am the product of Omnipotence. I was fash-
ioned by fingers infinite and modeled on a

plan divine. I am God’s masterpiece in His
visible creation. Hold fast that truth — then
take its corollary, a corollary that is all beau-

ty; you and I were made for God. That rav-

ishes. That enraptures. That should set us

in ecstasy. Life then is worth living, its bur-

dens suddenly lighten, its miseries quickly

change and, though the road be rough and

stony, though we stagger, stumble and fall,

though we must fight to a blinding fury, we
struggle on to win our way out and up to
Him who is Light and Love and Glory!

You and I are not creatures of Time; we
are Eternity’s children. Omnipotence did not

fashion you and me to grovel in the slime of
this world of matter and money-made men.

No! You and I were made for heaven, for

happiness, for God. We are more than a
body whose nakedness must be covered,

whose belly must be filled and senses glutted.

You and I are much more than hands and

head and heart; we are also souls! spirits of



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 29

immortality! We are as completely at home
in this welter of work and rest, eat and sleep,

that some call life, as a skylark would be in

the depths of the sea or a star in a stagnant

pooh

We have a goal to gain unconfined by this
world’s horizons; a destiny to achieve that

dwarfs all the accomplishments of genius.

You and I must scale the “hid battlements of

eternity” and fall into the arms of God. And

there is only one way to do it. It is by say-

ing and living “Fiat.”

To you and to me there is no such thing
as Fate or Fortune. The goddess of Fortune

and the allotments of Fate are monstrosities

of the pagan poets. Absolute lot, luck and

chance are the fabrications of the sluggish,

the lazy and the weak. Christianity knows no

gods or goddesses; Christianity bows only to

the Will of the one true God, the Maker of

all men and the lover of all souls. To this
Giant Lover you and I must go, but only in

the way He wishes — and that way was
taught us by the Man who said, “I am the
Way,” and then walked to Calvary! It is

Jesus Christ whom you and I must learn to
love and live. And He has said, “If any man
come after Me, let him deny himself, take

up his cross daily and follow Me.” Once I

have told you that, I have told you how to
mine your miseries and make them gold.
Bow to the Will of God, and He will reward
your adoration.

Christ did more than teach us how to die.
He expressly taught us how to live! And
from birth to burial, by His every act and

action, He made articulate His condemnation
of all that you and I have been taught by this

luxurious Twentieth Century. Remember
when He preached on the Mount? He prom-



30 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

ised much that day, very much. He told
hungry hearts that they could have their fill

of happiness. What a promise that is! But,
in all the promises of beatitude that fell from

lips divine, I find none that says, “Blessed

are the rich.” “Blessed are the comfortable.”

“Blessed are the prosperous, the well-off, the

worry-free.” I find none that says that the

Kingdom of Heaven shall be given to the

banker, the broker or the builder. To none

of these did Christ say “blessed.” Not that

He excludes the moneyed man and the weal-
thy woman, the leaders in society or politics,

from His Kingdom. No. But implicitly He

says to them, “If any man have money, he
must be poor in spirit. If any woman have
wealth, she must ever be ready to let it go;

her purse strings may close over gold, but
never her heart-strings, if she will be a Chris-

tian. If one has position, he must hunger and

thirst after justice, be full of mercy and al-

ways anxious for peace. Christ did not ex-

clude such people from His Kingdom, but

when He spoke His Sermon on the Mount, I
find Him directly and explicitly addressing
the others. I find Him promising blessedness
expressly to the poor, the meek and the

mourning, to the hungry and thirsty after

justice, to the merciful, the pure and the

peaceful, and very especially to the perse-

cuted. Those whom the world scorns, abuses
and hates, those whom the world despises,
sneers at or pities, those who are crushed by
the millstones of modern civilization, those

who stagger, strain and starve in this mad
maelstrom of materialism — these are the
blessed to whom Almighty God has promised
the Kingdom of Heaven, if they accept it all

as His Will! Suffering, poverty and persecu-

tion, do not, of themselves, sanctify; it is only

their acceptance as
'

part of God's all-wise



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 31

plan that brings grace in time and glory for

eternity. Ah! but let me tell you that these
beatitudes are more than promises; they are

prophecies. To you and to me they are say-
ing in accents unmistakable, “Unless you suf-

fer, for, by and with Jesus, you shall not be

saved.”

That is the money that can be minted in

this moneyless Depression. Gold, real gold,

can be dug from the depths of our miseries

and vaulted where thieves cannot enter, nor

moth consume, nor rust destroy. We have
but to bow to the Will of God and live “Fiat.”

When we are smitten with suffering, rejoice!
for salvation can come through tribulation.

We are not in this world for self-gratification
and self-glorification; we are here for purga-
tion and purification. If that sounds harsh,

remember that it is only a paraphrase of the

sentence spoken by the gentlest of all men,

the very Lamb of God.

We all should be looking for an Easter-
eternal; but we all must remember that no
Christian calendar can show us Easter until

after we have seen Good Friday. If we would
have the Resurrection and the Ascension, we
must first have the death and the burial;

Victory comes only with battle, triumph after

trial, honors after examination, success after

struggle and wages after work. If we would
get to heaven, we must walk the road that
Jesus walked, and that leads first to Geth-

semani, then to Golgotha, and then to a hill-

side tomb. But in rapid succession follow the

Resurrection, the Ascension and the Glorifica-

tion. If we would live worthy of our Chris-
tian name, we must die! die to all that the
modern world teaches and, if we would die
like Christ, we must live like Him. That
mystic poet, Francis Thompson, has caught



32 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

the truth of Christianity and seen it exem-

plified even in nature, so he says:

“The falling acorn buds the tree;

The falling rain, the greenery.

The fern-plants molder, where the ferns

arise,

For nothing lives but something dies;

And nothing dies, but something lives —
Till skies be fugitives.”

We must live like Christ, and we must re-
member that there was nothing anemic about
Jesus! He suffered agonies — and Christianity
without affliction would be Bethlehem with-

out a shivering Babe, Egypt without an

exiled Boy, Nazareth without the Village

Carpenter, Gethsemani without the Man of
Sorrows, and Calvary without the flayed and

flagellated, the mocked and spit-upon, the

thorn-crowned and heart-pierced Savior of

the world!

The law of life is struggle. The law of the

Christian life is war; war against Satan, sin

and self. The law of the godly Christian life

is bowing to all that the world calls “blows

and buffets,” the “slings and arrows of out-

rageous fortune,” but which we know to be
God’s blessings. So,

Be strong

We are not here to play, to dream, to drift.
We have our work to do and loads to lift.

Shun not the struggle — face it —
’Tis God’s gift!

When you listen in vain for the cry of a
child and learn that you will never be “Moth-

er” — then, though your heart fail, say, “God
is refining.” Or worse, when you are forced

to listen to hungry children cry and know



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 33

that they cannot be fed — then, through
blinding tears, say, “God is refining.” When
brilliant hopes are blighted and days without

end are only disappointments — grit your
teeth and say, “God is refining.” When
health goes and wealth goes and all the world

is gray — pierce the gathering gloom with
the cry of truth — “God is refining.” If the
Angel of Death takes your heart’s very life,

be it mother, father, brother or son, be it an

infant child or mellowed old age, fill the void

and break the hush with these words of wis-

dom, “God is refining.”

There is silver in your soul. It must be

made sterling, and “God sits as a refiner of

silver,” as His prophet Malachias foretold.

The Divine Silversmith sits by His fires,

watching, closely watching, His souls. They

must be purged and purified, and silver is

only refined by closely watched fires. If the

time be even the slightest extended, then

the silver is always ruined, and God, who
counts the hairs of your head, is not going

to allow His fires to injure your soul. He
will purify and clarify, He will sanctify and
render sterling this metal of His most precious

making.

A worker in silver will tell you that the
purifying process is ended when he can see
in the silver his own image. And I tell you
that life is over and eternity dawns when
the Silversmith Divine, who sits by His fires
of trial and tribulation, of sickness, suffering,

sorrow and death, of unemployment, disap-

pointment and universal Depression, sees in

the silver of your soul the image of His only-

begotten Son.

Do you now begin to understand your
Baptism? Do you now begin to realize what
Christianity is? At long last do you grasp



34 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

the meaning of life and the reason for living?

When the waters of Baptism flowed on your
head, you were made a child of God, and the

only child He has ever recognized is the One
who said, “I come to do Thy Will, O God.”
In that blessed birth, you were made a broth-

er to Jesus Christ, and He has said, “Whoso-
ever shall do the Will of My Father who is in
heaven, he is my brother”; in that divine
adoption, you were made an heir to heaven,

a home wherein “nothing defiled can enter.”

Life, then, is your process of purification, and

life’s difficulties are God’s closely tended fires.

That is why I say to you, “Rejoice when
suffering comes, for then you know that your
Father is refining.”

We know that statues would slumber for-
ever in the marble’s stony depths were it not

for the sculptor’s chisel and the hammer’s

heavy blows. We ought also to know that
suffering is the stony stuff from which we
can quarry our purest marble and chisel out

our image of Christ. Christian living is only

for artists, who want nothing but truth and

beauty and will rest satisfied only with per-

fection. The art of all arts and the life of

all living is modeling on Jesus Christ, and

that means making mines out of mountains

and molehills, by always saying, “FIAT,” for

we are here not for money but for merit!

Not Money — But Merit!
In my cloistered City of God I have a quaint

little classroom, and to it I always go when

your letters bleed my heart. It is out among
the crosses where one hundred years of sac-

rificial love sleep on in sacred peace. There,

the silent speak to me and the dead teach me
much about life. There is where I get vision

when all else is growing dark, for the dead



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 35

say, “Look long vistas; your perspective must

be true. Beyond Time’s near horizon is Eter-

nity’s endless shore.”

Thither to my faultless teachers I took your
latest cares. I wanted to know what should

be said to people who cannot see God; to peo-

ple who summon to the judgment seat of their

“thin minds” the Providence of the only om-

niscient One; to people who are implicitly

saying, “God is unjust,” “God does not rule,”

“God does not care.” And there amid the
thunder of my own tumultuous thoughts, I
heard the soft words: “Merit, not money.”

I stood behind the graves of our three most

recent dead; three lay Brothers, all fairly

aged men. One had been an orphan — for
fifty-one years he served his God in this gar-

den of Gethsemani; another had been a crip-

ple — for over two full decades he gave his
limping all; the third was a man of eighty-
two, who had found his way back to his first
fond love as the sun of his life was setting.

I stood and stared at their crosses and sud-

denly there flashed to my mind three names
that made a contrast antipodal. I thought
of Rockefeller, Carnegie and Wanamaker, and

I slowly said: “My brothers, you are right.
It is NOT money that counts. It is MERIT.”

Carnegie is reported one time to have said,

“I would rather be a citizen of the United

States than a member of the Kingdom of
Heaven.” When death came, I wonder if he
held to his preference. When judgment was
held for this Scotchman, do you think that

his stocks or his bonds, his countless costly

shares, his safety-vaulted millions counted? —
Not an iota! For life is for merit, not for

money!

When John Wanamaker died, two Irishmen
were overheard in a conversation that could



36 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

have been held only by two Irishmen. With

a wit that is their life’s blood and a depth

of perception that is characteristic of the Celt,

one was heard to say, “Well, I see that old

John Wanamaker is dead.” “You don’t say,”
said the other. “How much did the old
gentleman leave?” And with a chuckle that
was priceless, the answer came back, “Every

last red cent.”

True, isn’t it? And on the other side of
life another conversation took place; but I

doubt that it was quite so comical. Wana-

maker was not asked, “How much money did
you make?” but, “What do your merits total?”

John D. Rockefeller was a multimillionaire.

That you already know. But, if today, you

had to change places with him or my little
orphaned lay Brother, who gave to God one
half a century of service, whose place would

you choose? Not much question of choice,

is there? No! for merits count, not money.

The Oil King lived almost a hundred years;

but when his last moment of life came, he

saw how short a century of time can be and
how worthless was all his wealth. In life,

the contrast between him and the little orphan

who became a Trappist lay Brother was
sharp; at the moment of death, it was sharp-

er; and now in the endless day of Eternity it

is sharpest of all, for money DOES NOT
count! Merits DO!

“Money talks,” the saying goes, and it is

true. A millionaire can be speechless and yet
the most eloquent and persuasive of men.

Money also silences, for “hush-money” is no

fiction, it is a force. But there is one place

where money will be silent and one moment

when “hush-money” will not hush, and that

is Existence’s most important place and most

important moment. It is the place of death



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 37

and the moment of the judgment. Then all

will see with a blinding clarity that life was

only for merit and not for money; then all

will see that money talks and money silences

but money seldom prays; then all will see

that the millionaire is a pauper, and the beg-

gar, with his merits, is the richest of men.

Oh, I know that in our complicated modern

civilization, money is a necessity. But what

I am trying to show is that it is not the
prime necessity! What I am especially try-
ing to show is that of all the dust that gets

in men’s eyes, the most blinding is gold-dust.

I know that it is hard to live in this world

without money; but I also know, and I want

you to know, that without merit, you die for

all Eternity; I also know, and I want you

especially to know, that this is not our real

world, Eternity is! A few more years for
the youngest and most long-lived of us, and

it will not be a question of our income, but

of our output, not of our dollars but of our

deeds, not of the glory we got, but of the
glory we gave, and the greatest glory that
man can give is glory to God in the highest
by bowing down to His all-holy Will in a
heart-sincere “FIAT.”

If we are Christians, real red-blooded
Christians, we are modeling on Christ, and, if
there is one thing that Christ taught clearly,

it is the danger, yes, I might almost say, the

curse, of money. The gentle Jesus, whose
holy hands were laid on the putrefying flesh

of lepers, on the contaminated and contam-

inating flesh of the dead and the diseased,

whose hands clasped the foul Judas, more

filthy than filth, was never willing that His

hands should touch money. He told of Dives
and Lazarus; He was saddened by the walk-
ing away of the Rich Young Man; He spoke



38 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

that frightening word, “Amen I say to you,
that a rich man shall hardly enter into the
Kingdom of Heaven. ,, And yet, there are
those who call themselves Christians and
crave that deadly, dangerous thing called

money.

Think now of what they should be seeking.
Think now of what merit is. It is money made
by doing good deeds while in the state of

grace. Merit is wages won by work, the
works, both corporal and spiritual, of mercy.

It is the government bonds, those gilt-edged

securities procured by prayer, the Sacraments

and the Sacrifice. Merit is the only coin that

will pass as currency in the Kingdom of

Heaven. It is minted by those who change
the mountains of their miseries into El Dora-

dos by a “FIAT” and bank the very real gold,

dug from the depths of their afflictions, in the

safe-deposit vault of Christ’s Sacred Heart.

Merit is more than money, it is the gems

of the soul to be worn that glad day when

you and I make our bow to our King. Mer-
its are the pearls of purity, the blood-red

rubies of charity, the rare, noble opals of true

humility, which glow in their rich iridescence

with the seven spectral shades. It is the

gleaming emerald, mined in dark trial and

tribulation, the scintillant sapphire of penance

and prayer, the red-sprinkled blood-stone that

is found only in the deepest depths of soul-

shading affliction. These brilliants, can be

yours for the asking, if you remain in the

state of grace. But if you would have your

soul’s diadem blaze with a Koh-i-noor, whose

every facet shoots out rays that put the sun

to blush, then when you are childless or

homeless or jobless, when you are foodless

and penniless and hopeless, when your uni-

verse is black with pain and the battle of



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 39

life is so fierce that the will to win, the de-

sire to live, is gone — look up from your
depths and, though to your senses the whole

world reels, say, “Great God! Thy Will be

done. I am Thy creature. FIAT.”

Yes, merit is like money and gems, but mer-

it is even more like life’s full harvest. I like

to think of it as the pure white wheat that

has been growing in adversity and ground by

the cruel, crushing stones of life’s sad suf-

ferings. I like to think of it as the rich

ruby-red wine that has run from the squelch-

ing presses of worry, fright and care, those

merciless presses of sickness, suffering and

death, of headache and backache and heart-

ache, those omnipotent presses of life’s count-

less ills and woes. I like to think that when

life’s short day is done, we can stand before

our Great High-priest and with hands out-

stretched, make offering of spotless wheat for

one whiter host, and of blood-red wine for a

more rubied cup, that He may present us to
His Heavenly Father acceptable offerings, ful-

ly satisfying sacrifices. Such a fantasy be-

comes a fact when we live for merits and not
for money, when we learn to say, “FIAT.”

Odd, is it not — and yet perfectly com-
patible with the rest of Christianity’s puz-

zling paradoxes — that the economic Depres-
sion can be our spiritual exaltation and that

the more moneyless we become, the more
riches we can acquire? Odd, is it not, that
eyes that were tear-filled here below will

never weep in Eternity; that hearts that were

broken and hopes that were dead will leap

with life and swell with joy in our Paradise

beyond the stars. Odd? — No, not odd, except
to those whose tastes have been vitiated by

the ways of the world and who have forgot-
ten that Jesus said, “If any man come after



40 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

Me, let him deny himself, take up his cross

daily and follow Me”; that Jesus said, “The

Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and

only the violent bear it away.” The only

thing odd about our whole situation is that

we very illogically sweat and strain to change
our times, when what really needs changing,

is our tastes.

Change Our Tastes, Not Our Times!

Depression is a reality, a stark, nude and

naked reality, a fierce and snarling reality.

That, I am not denying. Ten years of blasted
hopes, fewer banks and longer bread-lines

tell that all too forcefully. And yet, I also
maintain that the Depression is a relativity.

There would never be a valley if there were

not two hills; never a depth if there was not

a height; never a plain if there was not a

mountain; and so what we call dark Depres-
sion, we would never have known if we had
not seen an excessive Rise. Our economic

exaltation was after the war; our present De-

pression is the past dark decade. So far I

have written obviosities; truths that no one

denies, but what all will not so readily admit,

and yet, what to me is an equal obviosity, is
that what many of us are calling “the depths

of dark Depression” are actually our strict

economic level! That is why I say the reality

is also a relativity.

Society has always been stratified. History

tells of freeman and slave, noble and serf,

landlord and tenant, rich and poor, capitalist

and laborer, the upper, the lower and the

middle class.

Normalcy obtained as long as the laborer

took his wage and guided his tastes by the

size of his earnings, as long as the middle-

class offered what the middle-class could buy



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 41

and the capitalist was satisfied with legiti-

mate profit and was not seeking pyramided

returns. When the poor got the middle-class

wages and the middle-class became rich, we

became abnormal. When the hodcarrier drove
his own car to work and the bricklayer was

landlord of a block of apartments, neither

times nor tastes were normal. The luxuries

of the middle-class became the necessities of

the poor, and the excesses of the wealthy

became the ordinary and the expected amidst

the one-time comfortable middle-class. At

this mad pace life went on for a few fren-
zied years and we saw an era of spending,
sporting and speculation never equaled in the

world’s long history. The intoxication ended

when the markets crashed and the banks

failed. Then the world awoke with a dark-

brown taste in its mouth and a very big

head. But those who had stepped up have
been unwilling to step down, and that is why
we hear people crying about a Depression
from what is actually an elevation!

I know that it must seem strange to have
a hermit talk to the world, and many of you
will wonder what title a recluse can claim

to tell the worldling his own business. The
only excuse I dare offer is taken from Gilbert

Keith Chesterton. Things had all gone wrong

and people were calling for a practical man.

Chesterton says, “It would be far truer to
say that when things go very far wrong we
need an unpractical man.” So, if you will al-

low an unpractical man to be practical, a
spiritual man to talk materialistically, and a
recluse to advise the world, I say, “Change
your tastes, and the times will take care of

themselves!”

When your salary allows for a comfortable
flat, you have no business to be living in a



42 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

mansion. Johnnie should not be going to

Harvard when you cannot afford the tuition

to the nearest Catholic College or hardly pay

his car-fare to the local State University.

Gertrude should not be being prepared for

Vassar when her place is helping at home.

Ambition is a grand thing, it is a blessing;

but prudence and honesty are virtues. Why
do you buy on the installment plan what you

will never own until your are paying the last
installments with your old age pension?

These are some of the practical thoughts

that are sired by letters that tell of a $25 a

week pay-envelope and a $45 a month apart-

ment; of six months unemployment and yet

borrowing to pay the installments on his car;

of earning a dollar and spending one hundred

cents and contracting installment debts for

a lifetime. Yes, I shout at such people,

“Change your tastes, and the times will al-

ready have changed.” There are as many
puffs of smoke in a 5c Cremo as there are in

a 35c Corona-Corona. You cannot live in
1940 as you did in 1925!

Have I wandered from my original theme?
— Not a half-step. All your unbalanced
budgeting has been brought about by that

cursed mistake of forgetting that life is for

merit, not for money; that we are here to win
our way to the top, but not the top of the
social ladder and the economic world, but to

the top of the spiritual world; that we are
not supposed to be spending our nights and

our days in a breathless endeavor to “keep

up with the Joneses,” but in one unending

effort to catch up with Jesus! It has all come

about by our compromised Catholicity, our

anemic Christianity, our dismal failure to

live to the hilt the lessons of our penny cate-

chism!



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 43

Our tastes have not been vitiated, they have

been totally corrupted. Who among us re-
flects on the fact that man can make money,

but money can never make a man; or that,

while many a man has succeeded in saving
money, money never has and never will suc-

ceed in saving a man. Who of us fully rea-
lizes that grace and gold are the strangest of

strange companions, and that experience

teaches that he who has the most of this

world's goods usually has the least of the

goods of and for heaven. Most of us would

prefer to be miserably rich than happily poor,

and most of us would quite readily mortgage

our very soul to Mammon. Most of us seem
to have forgotten that the greedy desire for

riches is the greatest possible obstacle to true

enrichment of a soul. And when do we ever
reflect on the fact that the richest man on
earth is nothing but a pauper, fed, clothed

and housed by the free bounty of a merciful

God?

No! I have not wandered one inch from

my original theme when I say, “Change your
tastes, and the times, as if by magic, will al-

ready have changed." Why don’t we be Cath-
olic? Practically the entire world has gone

off the gold-standard; why don’t we? Go off
it today and go on the grace-standard. It

will be far more stable and stabilizing. See
what a mountain of merit you can pile up

by changing your tastes and seeking first the

Kingdom of God, which is found by bowing
down to His sovereign all-wise, all-good, all-
merciful Will. Learn to say, “FIAT," and

your world will be re-made!

Take a lesson from life. Learn from the
children of this generation. Learn to buy
on the installment plan — your home, your
heavenly home, which is a “mansion prepared



44 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

from all eternity.
,, Pay for it by daily in-

stallments of merits won by bowing to the
Will of God, whether that Will be to your

liking or not. He may see fit to send you
even to the bread-line. If He does — thank
Him, and then be wise enough to join that

other line that forms in the early gray dawn-

ing and ends where a small, dancing flame

flickers its life away before the God of the

Universe buried in Bread. Join this line

which ends at the altar rail, and you will

get the Bread of Angels, the true Bread of

Life, the superstantial Bread, which is the

Body and Blood of the only Man who was
strong with the strength of omnipotence. He

will sustain you.

Yes, “Change your tastes!’’ That is my
cry to YOU! Sharpen your appetite for the
Sacraments; deepen your desire for the Sac-

rifice; whet your cravings for immortality,

and the Depression will soon be seen as a

very real exaltation, a blessing direct from

the hand of your Giant Lover to give you a

chance to mint merits!

Do you know that you are not really seek-
ing money? You do not want power, position

or fame. What you are really seeking is

what you think these things will bring. You

are hungry for happiness. That is why I
shout, “Change your tastes!” You will never
find happiness where you are looking. Never!

It is not to be found in a bank-account or in

the plaudits of the crowd. Its home is in the

heart. Happiness comes from within, not

from without.

Think back over the years that are gone

and find for yourself the happiest day that

you have lived. Most certainly it is not the

one on which you made the most money.

Think back on those days that are dead, and



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 45

you will find that you do not even think of

money. You may stop at the day that you

were married, for that day you got something

that gold cannot buy. You may stop at that

blessed day when, by the breath of God, life

was given and your earned the name of

“Mother” or could be spoken of as a “Dad.”

But if memory is long enough and tastes are

true enough, you will go back even beyond

these blessed days, you will go back to that

morn when, as a tiny tot, you clasped your

little hands and bent your little head and,

with all the reverence, recollection, innocence

and nervous anxiety of childhood, you walked

those blessed steps that brought you to the

altar rail and to your first Holy Communion.

That was the happiest day of your life! Not

because you were without worry or care; not

because you had not met suffering (the griefs

of childhood are more heart-breaking than

those of later years); not because you had

not known soul-sorrow, but because you had

come close to, you had actually received, your

God. Your tastes were true then, your in-

stincts proper, and that day was the happiest

of all happy days, because you had been

kissed, embraced, lost in the Lover of your

soul, your Jesus Christ. That day you knew
peace and joy. That day your heart was

really happy, for that day you got grace and

the Author of grace!

Do change your tastes, for what you are
calling treasure is more nearly trash. Learn

a lesson from this wise little lady whom I
call the wise little lady with the Catholic

heart. Her husband came home to her one
day at a most unusual hour. He was hag-
gard, worn and wan. He slumped into a chair
and said, “Mary, I am a ruined man. Every-
thing I had, is lost. I am a bankrupt. Every-



46 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

thing is in the hands of the sheriff to be sold

for what it will bring.” From the eyes that
tabernacled tears this brave little lady looked

at a very beaten man. As soon as she could

control her voice, she quietly asked, “Will the

sheriff sell you?” “No,” came the almost un-

thinking answer. “Will he sell me?” “No”

— the husband’s head was out of his hands
now, and he was looking questions at his lit-

tle wife. “Will he sell the children?” “No.”

Then our wise little lady went to a very puz-

zled man, put her two hands on his shoulders

and, looking deep into his troubled eyes,

smiled a bright smile and said, “Then don’t

say we have lost everything! We have love
and life” — and in a whisper she added, “and
God.” We have lost much, John, dear, very
much; but we have not lost true treasure.
The fruits of the years have gone; but we
still have God, our hearts, our hands and our

children. All else is really trash. Under God

we can start again.” Then before tears fell,

she kissed him.

Was she not right? Did she not know true
treasure? Learn from her. Learn to model

on Christ. Then, though your pockets may

often be empty, your hearts can always be

full; then, though skies be gray and even

black, you can have sunshine in your soul;

then, though money be lacking, you can al-

ways mint the true gold of merit and lay up

a treasure as overwhelmingly precious as it

is eternally incorruptible.

It is all a matter of following the Model

or falling into the muddle and though we
know much of the muddle from intimate and

personal contact, the same cannot be said of

the Model. We do not know Jesus Christ!
There is a way out of the Depression, be it
economic or moral. There is a way to live



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World i^ 47

life that is life. There is a way to be red-

blooded Catholics, and that way is to follow

the Model given us by the most perfect Man,

the most perfect woman, the most perfect

family. It is high time for us anemic Chris-

tians to forget the “Joneses” and to think only

of Jesus, Mary and Joseph!

Follow the Model and Avoid the Muddle!

Ours is a muddled world, a very muddled

world. That, no thinking man denies. Our
world is muddled in its ideas and its ideals,

its practices and its principles, its lives and

its loves; muddled it is in its aims and am-

bitions, its dreams and desires, its hopes and

its fears, but most muddled in its worships

and its religions. Ours is a very muddled

world because it has never studied its Model,

Over six thousand years ago a man and a
woman stood by a tree, they had just lost
grace. That was the sad start of it all. Sin

had darkened the human intellect and weak-
ened the human will. Paradise was lost that
day, and an angel with a flaming sword sent

your father and mine, your mother and mine,

out into a hostile world to earn their bread in

the sweat of their brows and to bring forth

their children in pain. That is why ours was
the inheritance of a muddled mind, a vacil-

lating will and passions that flame. That is

why ours was the legacy of a life amidst
briars that pierce, beasts that are savage, and

men who are worse than beasts. But God
added a clause, a saving codicil, to our awful

inheritance. He annexed a clause that prom-
ised us ultimate victory. Nineteen hundred

years ago that promise was fulfilled when it
was made possible for you and for me to be-
come heirs of heaven, adopted children, par-

takers in the nature Divine; for another Man



48 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

and another woman were near another Tree.
Then the expelling sword of the guarding

angel was sheathed and Paradise regained for

all who would follow the Model of the Son
who was a Father, and the Mother who was
a child.

Tell me honestly, have you ever studied
your Immaculate Mother or endeavored to

learn her ways? You bear the name of Chris-
tian; but what do you know of Christ? Now
is the time for the revaluation of all existing

values, and the only scale to follow is the

one given us by Omniscience. What is it? . .

.

The Trinity had determined that God

should become a Babe, so the Trinity took

counsel to see with what It would adorn that

creature who would one day be called the
Mother of the Redeemer and the Mother of

the Redeemed. Now remember that the
Trinity is omnipotent and all love, the Trinity

is omniscient and all truth; then what the

Trinity chooses for adornment must be the

most precious thing in all creation. Remem-
ber that the Trinity owns all things. It placed

the gold in the veins of the mountain and

deeply hid the diamond in the earth’s dark

folds; the snowy pearl It had created and

stored in the vaults of the sea. All the gems

that men call precious fell from the prodigal
hands of the Omnipotent. As for beauty —
stars dripped from Their fingers and silvered

the dome of the night; at Their Triune “Fiat”

the sun burst into flame; the lily of the field

is Their painting and done with such exquisite

art that Solomon in all his glory is put to a

blushing shame. The kings of the world

are Their making; palace and crown are

Theirs and They cloak with the royal purple

and scepter with imperial might whomsoever

They will. Power, position, beauty, fortune,



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World

!

49

name and fame — all are trinkets to the
Trinity. Yet, the creature crowned with

heaven’s luxury of luxuries was not found

in proud, imperial Rome or in haughty,
temple-crowned Jerusalem; but down in low-

ly little Nazareth, the Mother of God was

found, rich in the richest adomings that the

Omnipotent Three could create.

And what was it? Was it money? Was it
power, position or fame? Was it happiness
or joy-filled pleasure, as we reckon delights
and joys? Was it any of those things that
greedy man teaches you and me to seek in
the wide world’s busy marts? None! None

of these? It was not gold, nor greatness, nor

glory as muddled man conceives such things.
The gift of gifts from the infinite God was
to have Mary conceived immaculate. Grace!

Grace it is that Omnipotence and Omniscience

chose as the greatest gift that God could
give His Mother.

Do you grasp that truth? ... If you or I

had the making of our own mother and had
all things at our command, would we give
her anything but the best? God did the same.
He gave Mary His very best, and it was
GRACE! In our readjustments of mental
modes and outlook, in our revelations of all

existing values, then, the first place must go

to grace. And in all life’s zealous questings
the first thing to seek is grace. It is the most

important thing in life and after-life. For

when “life’s fitful fever” is over, we must
be rich with the gold that will bring us close

to God, and that is the gold of grace.

Now ask yourself honestly — how often
do you add to your store? How often do you
make an earnest energetic effort to gain more
of what God has shown to be the greatest
thing in all His great creation? How much



50 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

of your thought and your time do you give

to the acquisition of the one and only thing

that you can take with you beyond the grave?

Grace, you know, is won through the Sac-
raments, the Sacrifice and prayer.

If we are to model on Mary, the first thing
we want is grace. That was God’s first gift
to her. He made her immaculate and full of
grace. Sinlessness and sanctity — pearls be-
yond price — He gave her and gave her them
from her conception. The other great gift

He gave also begins with an “s,” and this He
gave her in abundance from the Annunciation

to her Assumption, from the “Fiat” she

breathed at Nazareth to her coronation as

heavenly Queen. The Trinity’s third great

gift made her Mother of Sorrows, Queen of

Martyrs and Consoler of the Afflicted, for it

was SUFFERING. Strange collocation of
words, is it not? “The gift of suffering” -

—

and yet, I know that God would give His

Mother nothing but the best.

How soon it all started! Joseph, her spouse,
“was troubled and sought to put her away”;

then came Bethlehem’s cold closing one by

one of doors. Forty days fled from Christ-

mas, and she took her Boy to the Temple

to present God to God. Simeon, in his aged

arms held Infinity and sang in accented joy

his sweet swan-song, his “Nunc dimittis.”

Then handing back the Babe to the Mother

he spoke that bitter prophecy that set the

little Mother’s heart ableeding. “Thine own

soul a sword shall pierce,” and seven times,

we know, it was fulfilled. Seven deadly times

was Sorrow’s savage sword sheathed to the

very hilt in the scabbard of the heart of her

whom the man in me calls, Lady, and the
boy in me calls, Mother. Thus it was that
the most beautiful of women became the



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 51

Mother of Sorrow, the Queen with the broken

heart. From the very beginning the Lily of

Israel was a crushed and broken bloom. I

wonder if it was because crushed flowers give

a more fragrant and a fuller perfume? I do

not really know, but of this I am sure, that
God chiseled with a sharpness unmistakable

the model for all men . . . Sinlessness . . .

Sanctity. . . Sorrow. Of this I am equally
sure, that by becoming the Mater Dolorosa she

also became the Consoler of all the Afflicte'd.

Are you homeless? — Then think of Mary.
In the dark of night she clasped Jesus to her

bosom and hurried out into the Sahara's sea

of sand to find lonely exile in Egypt beyond

the Nile.

Are you childless? — Then think of Mary.
Think of the three endless days and the

longer nights that she spent with broken

heart and tear-blinded eyes searching, ever

searching for her Boy.

Are you jobless? — Think of Mary. Think
of the daughter of King David who became
the spouse of a village carpenter. Think of

the poverty, the pinching poverty of Naz-

areth, and know that it was the deliberate
choice of an all-wise God!

Is your dear one sick! — Then think of
Mary. She had to stand by the deathbed of

her Boy, denied all the comfort and consola-

tion of helping the agonizing. She could not

smooth the pillow of thorns, or freshen the

hard bed of the cross. She could not bathe

the blood-filled and fevered brow, nor quench

His burning thirst with so much as a tear.

Have you lost your parents? — Then re-
member that Mary, your model, was orphaned
early; for Saints Joachim and Anne went to
Limbo to await their little girl who would be



52 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

their Queen and their little Grandchild, who
was their God.

Has half your heart gone to heaven? Are

you a lonely widow? — Then think of Mary.
She closed Joseph’s eyes one sad day, laid

him beneath the sod and then came back to

a house that was filled with echoes — only
echoes — of the gentlest saint of God’s crea-
tion.

Has a cradle been turned to a coffin; or is

there a vacant chair? Has some loving heart

that was beloved been forever stilled? —
Then look long at our little Lady as she holds

in the paten of her virgin hands the broken

Host of Calvary’s First Mass. Look very

long at our Queen, our Mother and our Model,

as she turns from the mammoth stone that
locks Arimathea’s hillside tomb and hides

from her eyes the Body of her murdered Boy,

that Sacred Body of God that was bone of

her bone, flesh of her flesh, and heart of her

heart.

Do you see how the Mater Dolorosa became
the Consolatrix Afflictorum?

Neither you, nor I, nor any one else, will

ever suffer as Mary suffered, and through it

all she spoke one word — it was, “FIAT.”
That was the answer that she gave to God’s

first messenger Gabriel. That was the answer

she gave to the seven other messengers of

God which we call “Dolors.” Bethlehem’s
unkindness cut, and so did the hillside cave,

but Mary said, “Fiat.” Egypt’s exile hurt,

but not so much as Jerusalem’s loss, yet Mary

said, “Fiat.” To every station of the Way of
the Cross she staggered and fell with her Son,

but the grief of griefs was that Longinus’

spear-point found His heart and not hers —
still she said, “Fiat.” Crushed Lily of Israel,



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 53

broken-hearted Queen, sorrow-swamped

Mother of God and our Model!

“Fiat” was her favorite prayer, and be-

cause of it Angels and Archangels now fold

their wings in holy adoration; Cherubim and

Seraphim bow in loving veneration; Thrones,

Powers, Dominations with the Virtues and

the other Choirs before her make prostration;

earth’s every generation calls her “Blessed,”

and you and I have her for invocation and

consolation. Because she always said, “Fiat,”

her tomb was found white with lilies, and

Heaven held high jubilee as the Triune God

crowned a creature from earth and made

Mary Queen of Creation.

There is our Model and our inspiration.

After Sorrow’s seven swords came the As-

sumption and the Coronation. Because her

heart was pierced her head was crowned; and

one day you and I will see our Mother’s

heart, and its blazing beauty will flame from

seven wounds of love. Mary’s rosary has fif-

teen long decades, but the last five are glo-

rious. Ours can be the same if we follow

the Model and say, “FIAT.”

We cannot miss the lesson, the Christian
philosophy of life, the startling paradox that

suffering is the way to joy. Jesus will not

allow us. A shivering Babe, an exiled Boy,
a sweating Carpenter, the Man of Sorrows,
all should unerring teach the truth; but Jesus

knew that man’s intellect is dull and man’s
memory is short, so He etched His lesson in
steel. He used three spikes and a spear.
One went through His feet, one through each

of His hands, and the spear went through

His Heart. Thus did He emblazon with Blood
Divine the truth of all truths for man, name-

ly, there is only one road to heaven, and it is

not the highroad. Not the wide-open road of



54 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

pleasure, popularity, riches and pride, but

that narrow, black, staggering stony, stum-

bling and often bloody way of poverty, pain
and humility. He knew that the only truths
that remain in the fleeting memory of man
are those that are written in blood, so from

Gethsemani to Golgotha His every step is

bloody. Have we learned those lessons?

With His Sermon on the Mount He had
turned all human hierarchies upside down.
He climaxes that Sermon with the Sermon
from the Cross to show you and me that the
world is topsy-turvy, that its values and its

very sense of values are all wrong. When are
we going to listen to Omniscience and stop
giving our ear to muddled man? When are
we going to be Catholic? When are we going
to follow our Model in everything? If pain,

be it physical or mental, be something evil,

then God is not God!

How little we know our Christ and our
Christianity? He taught us, and He still
teaches us everything. He is not only our

Model of how to suffer and how to die; but

He is our Model of how to pray, to work and
to live. But we are dull, very dull pupils.
We take His promises gladly. We delight
in the thought of His heaven; but the way
there, how many of us know? How few of
us take! — “If any man come after Me ... let
him DENY HIMSELF . . . take up his CROSS
. . . and follow Me.”

Would you learn how to do this? How
to live red-blooded Christianity? How really
to follow Jesus Christ? . . . Then say, “FIAT.”

Say, “Thy Will be done!” That is what He
always said, and that is what He always did.

His prophet gave us a pen-picture of the Son

of God when he wrote, “In the head of the
Book it is written of me: Behold I come to do



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 55

Thy Will, O God.” He Himself summed up
His life by saying, ‘T do always the things

that please Him.” He was asked to teach us

how to pray, and He made solemn answer

saying: “Our Father, who art in heaven, Thy

Will be done. . . .” But knowing the weakness

even of Omnipotent’s words with the mind

of man, He acted out His lesson one night

in Gethsemani’s garden. Though it sent His

Heart’s blood spurting, from the pores of His

beautiful face, He said “FIAT.” “Not My
will, but Thine, be done.” That He meant

His prayer is evidenced by a blood-splashed

corpse on a blood-soaked cross that was flung

against a blackening sky on the Friday that

we now call “Good.”

His life was one long FIAT, and He closed

His life with the greatest of all His FIATS,

for just before He “gave up the ghost” He

uttered a loud cry; but He changed the mood
and the tenses ... it was no longer “Thy Will

BE done,” it was now “Thy Will IS done,”
and all mankind had a lesson on how to live
and how to die.

Are you and I this moment following the
Model or are we in a very real muddle? Are

we red-blooded Christians or are we only
anemic, straddling, staggering Catholics? Are

our standards those of Jesus Christ or do we
try to compromise and weigh worth in the

lying scales of the world? Here is your test

and your touchstone. . . . When sorrow comes,
do we rebel or do we say, “FIAT,” as we
think of the sign of the cross?

The Shadow and the Sign of the Cross

The cross had always meant suffering, and

even yet we speak of our sufferings as “our
crosses”; but Christ has turned things so far

upside down that the cross has now become



56 Say "Fiat” and Remake Your World!

the sign of blessings and we bless ourselves
with the sign of the cross. Before Good Fri-

day the cross was a gibbet of infamy and

shame; today it is a jewel. Before Good Fri-

day it was hideous and hateful; today it is

so loved that it can be seen as the gorgeous

gold pendant gleaming at the throats of

beautiful women. Before it was the sign of

disgrace and meant degradation; today it is

our exaltation. They shunned it in the ages

past; today it is kissed and venerated, for it

is the only key to heaven. And the sign of
the cross, or even its shadow, is the surety of

salvation.

That is why when suffering comes we say
“FIAT,” for we know that we are being
blessed.

Tell me why I should not revel in the
sign of the cross. It has given me everything
that is of value and it promises me more.
And the same is true for you!

Look! We were still-born babes as far as
heaven was concerned, for our first Parents

had sinned. But Baptism gave us life, real,

supernatural life. It was like creation all

over again with God breathing the breath of

life into our dead souls. Baptism made us

children of Omnipotence and that adoption

neither you nor I shall fully appreciate “till

skies be fugitives.” Baptism stamped your

souls and mine with the only sign that will

be recognized in the Kingdom of God, and

Baptism was given with the sign of the cross!

Then find for me, if you can, amongst your

souvenirs sweeter memories than those mo-

ments you spent at Mother’s knee learning

the sign of the cross.

When old enough we went to the Miracle
of all miracles — the Mass. Therein we saw
countless signs of the cross, for the Mass



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 57

IS Calvary’s cross erected again, without the

pain and without the shame, but with all the

glory to God, of Golgotha. Think of it . .

.

at the whispered words of a man, the Infinite

God leaps down from heaven to hide Him-

self in a tiny wheaten wafer and then dies

that we might live!

When giving you the Bread of Angels the

priest does so with the sign of the cross.

Then, when we have played traitor and

blackened our souls with the filth of sin, par-

don, an infinite pardon, is given us in abso-

lution with the sign of the cross. What a

miracle and mystery is absolution! It caused

Cliff Laube, speaking of Magdalene, to ex-

claim in rapturous awe:

“No ray, no art can reillume

A wilted water-lily’s bloom;

No alchemy reclaim

A once extinguished flame.

But Innocence, by Heaven’s Grace,

Shone again in Mary’s face!”

So, too, from your eyes and mine went

that look of shame and that slinking glance

of guilt as we were given permission to lift
up our head again and breathe. Absolution

has been to us, time and time again, a resus-

citation, a resurrection, a rehabilitation. . . .

It is given with the sign of the cross!

Those of you who are married can readily
recall that God’s witness signed your sacred

dedications with the sign of the cross. And
I was made more than man by a bishop who
chrismed my palms, rested his hands on my
head and gave me a paten and a chalice that
I might live the sign of the cross.



58 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

From birth to burial and even after, it is
always the sign of the cross. At Baptism it

gave us life, at Confirmation, strength, resus-

citation after suicide of sin came from ab-

solution and its sign of the cross. Under that

sign we are given the Bread of Angels and
receive the Triune God into our souls. It

blesses your marriage and stamped me priest,
and when we are at death's door it will
anoint the five gateways to our intellect. It

will consign our bodies to the sod and then

stand silent sentinel over our dust until the

general resurrection. That is the day on

which it will be seen in all its splendor, and

that is the day that the sign of the cross will

serve as the beam of that balance which

will weigh the worth of souls, telling with

unerring accuracy those who lived under it,
loved under it and died under it; then, for

all eternity, joy will be found in the sign of

the cross. Why, then, when its shadow falls

across my heart, should I not say, “FIAT”?
I say “shadow” for, though masters in the

spiritual life and writers of sound asceticism

speak of sufferings as “splinters” from the

cross of Christ, I am learning something of
the torrent of torture that overwhelmed our

Love on that awful day of terror and triumph,

and that is why I say that neither you, nor
I, nor any man receives more than the mere
“shadow” of Calvary’s cross. Yes, even

though dishonor, degradation, and lifelong dis-

grace be our part, though we stagger through
a world of shattered hopes, stumbling at every

turn over the unpolished stone of our dreams’

unfinished foundations, though we reel
through life blinded with the mists rising

from a broken heart, I still say we have only

a “shadow” and not a “splinter” from the

monstrous Tree on which our Brother

breathed His last,.



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 59

Why should we not say “FIAT” — for that
sign is ever illumined with the legend that

blazed for Constantine these 1600 years that

are gone. Look closely and you will always

read, “In hoc signo vinces” — “In this sign,
and in this sign alone, you shall conquer.”

Under that sign we shall conquer the uncon-
querable. We shall conquer self, conquer
sin, conquer Satan, and above all conquer

the world! Why, under that sign, and under

it alone, we shall conquer the unassailable
stronghold of heaven. Yes, we shall conquer,
you and I, and conquer under that sign, but

only if we live under its shadow. If we war
under the shadow and the sign of the cross,

if we live under it and die under it with an
ever ready “FIAT” on our lips and a real

worship in our hearts for the Will of God, we
shall glory under it forever!

Does all this talk of the “cross” frighten

you? Well, know that it is not mine; it is
the word of the strongest, purest, bravest, ten-

derest, truest Lover that ever lived. It is the

word of Jesus Christ. “If any man come
after Me,” He said, “let him take up his
cross.”

I give you no sentimental Christ, for I want

you to live no sentimental Christianity. Let

us have done with anemia! Let us be full-

blooded, red-blooded, fiery-blooded followers

of Jesus Christ. He is God, and by deliberate
choice He took what our mad, modern age
tells us to avoid. He took poverty, humility
and pain. He took suffering both mental and
physical. He took agony and the cross. He
took a broken Heart from Bethlehem’s cave

to Arimathea’s tomb, and lest we doubt it,
He had His side spear-dug so that all the
world might read His love.



60 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

And yet — Man of Sorrows though He was
— there never was a happier man to walk
the ways of our world. Paradox? Yes, Di-

vine Paradox that teaches us truth. Happi-

ness is not outside, it is entirely within. It is

found in the mind, the heart and the will;

the mind that sees God in all things, the heart
that loves God in all things, the will that

says “FIAT” to all things except sin. Christ

is a mighty mystery, but the source of His

peace, His imperturbable happiness, is not a

mystery. He told it at birth, in life and at
death. It is found in the one word “FIAT.”

And the Christianity that has lived Christ
has found the truth in that paradox. There

IS joy in suffering, heart-thrilling joy. If

you doubt it, go to the nearest convent or

monastery and see there women in the grand
blush of their full youth or in the golden-

glow of their mellow old age, see men burst-
ing with virility, young and old, and all ra-

diating joy. They lead what the world calls

“painful” lives, and yet they have what the

world cannot give, for it is what the world

has not got. They have peace, a profound

peace, which gives true happiness and brings

lasting joy.

Would you know the secret? It is this:
they have mined their mountains and their

molehills; they seek merit and not money;

they changed their tastes and not the times;

they follow the Model and avoid the muddle.

Would you further know the secret? They

do all under the shadow and the sign of the

cross and are always saying, “FIAT! FIAT!”

If you still doubt it, if you still wonder if

there can be joy in suffering, let me tell you
this . . . the happiest body of men that I have
ever had the great good fortune to see is the

community of Trappist monks, these one hun-



Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World! 61

dred and twelve men buried alive in this

monastery of Our Lady of Gethsemani. They

have nothing, absolutely nothing, as the

world weighs worth, and yet — they have
ALL! The smart world smiles at their “de-

lusion”; the knowing world pities their “me-

dievalism”; and yet, I find them living a

REALITY in an ULTRA-MODERN way.
They have forgotten “blue-blood” and

“brown stone fronts” in their manly quest

for whiteness of soul and redness of heart.

They are living the life of all living, for they

are loving with a blazing love the Love Who
never will die. They are happy, these men,

unbelievably happy, because their lives are

one long “FIAT” and their death will be a

“Consummatum est.” They are always doing

the Will of God, and that is why they will
die smiling, changing their lifelong “Thy Will

be done” into “Thy Will IS done.”

Forgive me if I seem to be boasting, but
know well that I am merely stealing a
thought from St. Paul. He said: “God for-
bid that I should glory save in the cross of

Christ.” Know well that I am only trying
to give you the secret of success in life and

of triumph at death. Know well that I will
penance my body and pray out my heart for
all the requests you send me, but over and

above them all, I beg God to give you the
sight to see and the will to say, “FIAT.”

Won’t you try it today? Tomorrow is a
long way off. In fact, tomorrow may never
come. “Tomorrow” is the slogan of Satan,

for very few people ever do tomorrow what

they put off today. So, do start now, for

some “tomorrow we die,” and

“When I am dying, how glad I shall be
That the lamp of my life has been burned

out for Thee;



62 Say "Fiat" and Remake Your World!

“That sorrow has darkened the pathway I

trod,

That thorns and not roses were strewn

o’er its sod;

“That anguish of spirit full often was mine,

Since anguish of spirit so often was Thine.

“My cherished Rabboni! how glad I shall
be

To die with a hope of a welcome from

Thee!”

Give fire and flame to that hope by always

saying, “FIAT.” And remember that every
blessing an infallible Church gives, is given

with the sign of God’s suffering, and that is

why I can tell you every suffering is an
infallible sign of God’s blessing on those who
say, “FIAT.”

Let us have done with anemia. Let us

live red-blooded Christianity. Let us bravely

embrace the Will of God. Away, then, with

compromise and on with Christ. Live under

the shadow and the sign of the cross. It

blesses. It purifies. It sanctifies. It will

glorify! Learn to say “FIAT,” and your

world IS re-made!

May God always bless you, even though it
be with the “shadow” of His cross!

FIAT VOLUNTAS TUA!

Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani

Holy Thursday, March 21st

Nineteen hundred and forty

MISSION PRESS, S.V.D., TECHNY, ILL.



BOOKS AND BOOKLETS

SUPPLIED BY THE ABBEY OF OUR LADY

OF GETHSEMANI

The Family that Overtook Christ $2.75

The Man Who Got Even with God 2.00

Life of Dom Edmond Obrecht 1.50

Life and Times of St. Bernard 6.50

St. Bernard on the Love of God 1.50

The Soul of the Apostolate paper 1.00

cloth 1.25

leather 2.50

The Cistercian Life .50

Joseph Cassant, Trappist Priest . . paper .50

cloth .75

Yvo Poussin, Trappist Lay Brother

paper .65

cloth 1.00

Louise Tessier 1.00

Descriptive Booklet of Gethsemani Abbey .25

Cistercian Nuns 1,50

Order of Citeaux 1.75

Holy Abandonment, Dom Lehodey .... 4.00

Spiritual Directory (Cistercian) 2 vols.

each 1.75

Spirit of Simplicity 40

Lieutenant Michael Carlier, Monk 2.00



BOOKLETS (10 cents each)

REDUCTION FOR QUANTITIES

Are You?

Fiat and Remake Your World

Life is a Divine Romance

The God-Man’s Double

What’s Wrong?

Set the World on Fire

Doubling for the Mother of God

What Are You Doing to Jesus Christ?

Do You Want Life and Love?

Have You Met God?

For Your Own Defense

A Startling Thing for You

To Mothers Who Have Sons in the Service

Eventually: Why Not Now?

Apostolate of the Contemplatives

Master Magnet (St. Bernard)

24 Hours a Catholic

An Hour With Christ

Let’s Build a Home

Our Lady of Gethsemani

Trappist, Ky.





v
JUN 10 1946

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