I've been a member of the Confraternity of Angelic Warfare for about a year now and prior to joining it I had heard so many testimonies of immense healing or growth in the virtue of purity. I, however, didn't experience any exceptional help or growth in the virtue but continued to find the confraternity important in my life; one reason being daily praying for my brothers in sisters enrolled in the confraternity. Well the Lord works in humble and simple ways with a calm and quiet voice so of course I was simply being ignorant and unaware of the ways He'd strengthened the virtue in me.
This past summer I kind of had a little bit of a panic attack on my twentieth birthday because I hadn't dated anyone and still remained unkissed. (Yep, it's true, and remains true to this date.) But in prayer one night, a few more months into the summer and past my May birthday, I had an epiphany. What a blessing it is to be so pure and untouched! I've had a lot of my friends expressed to me how jealous they are of me or how special it is that I haven't kissed anyone and I never really understood why but as they explained it to me and as I continued praying my confraternity prayers I came to realize how beautiful that purity is. I don't mean to say if you're twenty and have been kissed or well, more, that you're a terribly impure person; I certainly look forward to the day when I am kissed by whatever man ends up being my special someone. But there is just something special about saving that for him.
Now having this beautiful realization of this gift of purity the Lord has blessed me with, I desired to truly treasure my purity. What I mean is, once I do start a relationship, I don't just through it all out the window or take for granted the gift that I've been given.
So recently when I've daily prayed the two chastity prayers and fifteen Hail Marys for the confraternity I've asked the Lord to give me the gift of truly treasuring the virtue of purity. This intention has been on my heart and in my prayers for a month or so now, a little longer than I've been doing Louis Marie de Montfort's preperation for the Total Consecration to Jesus through Mary. I'm on the final stage of the preparation prayers which includes the Litany of the Holy name of Jesus. As I was praying the Litany for the first time since I'd begun the consecration I was struck by this prayer: "Jesus, Purity of Virgins."
Jesus IS purity. How can I help from treasuring my purity if it is Jesus?
I just thought I'd share that little testimony to tickle your minds and maybe lead you to consider the virtue of purity in your life.
Food for thought: Blessed Pope John Paul II's thoughts on 1 Thessalonians 4:3-5, "Piety as a gift of the Holy Spirit seems to serve purity in a particular way by making the human subject sensitive to the dignity that belongs to the human body in virtue of the mystery of creation and redemption."
As someone who doens't quite share in the same past purity, I can really appreciate other peoples and the purity that i do have and i remember that it's never too late to start fresh =)
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