November 17, 2003 

"Purifying the Intercessor"

Even though intercessors pray for graces for others, at the same time we're also dealing with our own sins.  We're not that sinless Lamb like Jesus was, but we're trying.  We're in the process of becoming pure.  The Lord will always teach us how to proceed in each case and take us to another level, deeper and deeper, healing the wounds of others while healing the wounds within the intercessor personally.  Intercessors go from level to level to level as God begins to trust us more as He sees our faithfulness.  God calls us into a ministry like this to take on other people's sin in addition to our own, to carry their burdens for them for awhile so they can be free to receive and accept graces.  

So at this level of intercession, it can be like doing double-duty at times: carrying other people's sins while still trying to eliminate our own.  This is why the helmet of salvation is so essential; we must know that God loves each one of us personally at a very deep level.  Our minds must be cleared of negativity, anger, rebellion, resentment, and all those emotions that can tear us away from God, or else when the transference of sin comes, we will not be strong enough to fight it. 
 
Transferences usually will involve our emotions.  Have you ever gotten up in the morning feeling very irritable and naturally speaking, you don't have any reason to be irritable?  We used to say, "I guess I got up on the wrong side of the bed."  Well maybe we did, but maybe we didn't.  Maybe God is using us, and we are in intercession.  Whenever we feel that we may be in intercession for something or for someone, we must always first treat it as if it is our own sin.  Otherwise we can say, "Oh, I can act this way because I'm in intercession," and use it as an excuse for our behavior.  "I'm sorry I was so crabby.  I think I was in intercession."  We have to be careful not to do that.  Just because we're in intercession doesn't give us a reason to be uncharitable. 
 
So, first we treat this burden as our own sin and take action against it as though it were our own.  If it is our own personal sin, we'll come out the better for it.  If it's somebody else's sin that we are carrying, we'll both come out better for it.  We can only win when we're dealing with decreasing sin!  This burden, this emotion or sin, will actually be placed upon us and the transference itself will often tell us how to pray.  If you're angry and you don't see the connection to your life at the time, you can almost be sure somebody is angry and needs to be released from this kind of anger. The quicker we can recognize that emotion, bring it to God, and pray for that grace to come to whoever needs it, the sooner they will be healed.  Whatever we are experiencing for them will be lifted sooner from us, also, and we will be less likely to fall into that sin ourselves.  If we don't pray for that grace for them, then we're going to struggle with that anger ourselves and all of a sudden, if we're not careful, it can become our own personal anger, and we'll lash out at somebody and sin ourselves.  

For some reason, we seem to be living in a very angry culture, a very angry nation.  I don't know when I've ever been aware of so much anger at so many levels.  Intercessors can experience anger at many different levels, and it can take all the energies you have just to be nice when you're feeling this way, but don't give in to it.  You want to deal with it and pray for whomever it is that lives in this kind of anger.  Once you obtain that grace for someone, you will know it almost immediately because that emotion will lift from you.  It just lifts almost as quickly as it came.  When we're dealing with our own emotions and sins, it doesn't lift that easily.  We have to work it through. 
 
So as intercessors, we carry our own emotions and can at times carry transferences of other people's emotions as well.  It  happens so naturally that sometimes we can't tell the difference.  We may wonder, "Is this my real feelings or is this someone else's?" We can ask a prayer partner or somebody in a prayer group to pray for us because we need to know if we're in intercession or not.  It makes a big difference to us if we know we're in intercession and not just dealing with our own personal sin.  It does help to know.  This is why it's always good to be in contact with someone who understands this kind of ministry.  We need support.   
 
Once we know we're in intercession, we start praying, "God, please give them the grace to get out of this!  Please give it to them."  One time I was on my way home from noon Mass, and the priest at the parish said, "By the way, Sister, would you pray for me?"  I said, "Certainly, Father."  I got in the car and started lifting him up in prayer, "Please help him, dear God, whatever he needs."  He hadn't told me what he wanted me to pray for.  I was driving in familiar surroundings, I think I could have almost driven it blindfolded, but I missed the turn and ended up going in circles.  It took awhile to get back on the freeway.  I thought, "Isn't this strange?  This has never happened before.  I missed a turn.  Something must have been confusing me." 

Now, I'm back driving in circles so I can get back on the interstate again and that's when the light came, "The priest that just asked you to pray is in confusion.  He is going in circles."  The Lord showed me that he needed to make an important decision.  So, there was a transference-I had his confusion, but while I was going in circles, he was able to think clearly, get his discernment, and he made a wonderful decision!  This is called "being the victim of your own intercession."  I was able to carry the confusion for this priest for a brief while so that he could get that light and direction from the Lord.
 
We have transferences all the time.  Transferences are not only in our emotions, they can also be physical transferences.  Somebody might get a headache for no reason.  A headache can be very symbolic of the crown of thorns which Jesus wore to combat the sin of pride.  So we pray, "Lord, whoever is struggling with pride, please give them the humility to say ‘yes' to You, to surrender their lives to You."  And the more we pray, the more God's graces come, and hopefully someone out there has received the graces to surrender more completely to the Father's will for them, and then the headache goes away!
  
There is a price on every soul.  St. Paul said, "You have been purchased, and at a price"(1 Cor 6:20).  Paul had an insight into the cost, the tremendous price of a soul.  There is a price on every healing and we, as intercessors, are to be like Jesus and say "yes" to carrying some of the burden with Him.  We are to be part of the answer to our own intercession, even though it  may involve suffering.  Often our suffering may be the whole answer to bring forth healing  and sometimes it will only be part of the answer. 

The transference will cause an intercessor to struggle in whatever area God wants him to be strengthened in.  For example, if the prayer is going to free someone from his anger, then that will be what the intercessor will be struggling with himself in his own personal life.  The intercessor will willingly accept the struggle, and once he sees a change in himself where he is managing his anger better, gaining territory in that area, he will know, "I've got it."  Once he gains that intercessory territory and has wrestled successfully with those same issues himself, then anytime he needs to pray in that area for anyone or anything, having already won the battle within himself, the graces will come.  

The Lord will always guide us and teach us how to proceed in each case.  As we progress in holiness, He will take us to another level, deeper and deeper, healing the wounds of others while healing the wounds within ourselves.  We might carry these burdens for others for a short period of time because we are victim lambs of the Lord.  As Mary instructed the waiters at the wedding feast of Cana, "Do whatever he tells you" (Jn 2:5), she is encouraging us also. "Follow and accept whatever He gives you so that the life giving water that He nourishes us with will soon turn into the Body and Blood of Christ."  Our offering, our willingness to carry burdens for others, laying down our lives, can bring forth the dying and rising of Christ again but in others.  We are letting Him do whatever He wants. 

We have given Him our "yes," but we won't be in the trenches day in and day out.  We will get a break!  But what will come forth within us from carrying others' burdens is a compassion for the people who actually live in this type of bondage to sin constantly.  It will motivate us to pray for their release, for their peace.  We can see how heavy a burden sin can be in someone's life when we are carrying their load for awhile.  We can see how it is terribly difficult for a person to feel like they want to love God or anybody else if they're feeling this heaviness and darkness.  So God releases these heavy burdens from them, asks us to carry it for awhile until the graces of peace come to them and they can get their lives back in order. 

Depression is a difficult transference because we always think it's our own.  We question ourselves, "Where did this come from?  Do I have some kind of repressed anger?  Didn't I get my own way?  Did somebody step on my toe?  What's going on?"  We kind of look at ourselves and question, "Am I getting enough rest?  Am I eating right?  Am I being faithful to prayer?"  This is good-we always need to check out the basics within ourselves first, but when we find that we're okay, we can almost always arrive at the conclusion that we're carrying somebody else's depression.  We can feel that burden and heavy darkness.  We carry this a lot right now, and I'm sure that intercessors in other areas of the country do, too, because the suicide rate is so high.  There is tremendous depression, discouragement, and lack of hope within our country.  Intercessors can feel this as a transference and will carry the burden for others, praying for those graces for them to get out from under this terrible bondage.  The darkness will start to lift, they will begin to experience God's love, and the healing process will begin.  This is good news!
 
The  heaviest burden that gets laid upon intercessors is pride.  We are coming against this a lot because this is the sin of all sins.  Pride can be manifested in rebellion, anger, spiritual pride, and is part of each of the seven capital sins (pride, greed, envy, anger, lust, gluttony, and sloth).   Pride can be subtle sometimes.  It takes tremendous virtue and energies of an intercessor to really be obedient, to be little, to remain hidden and vulnerable when being assaulted by the emotion of pride.  When we're carrying the sin of pride, everything within us wants to strike back and be aggressive, terribly assertive, demanding, and obnoxious.  This is a very difficult burden to carry for others as it is also very much within ourselves-in our minds, psyches, spirits, and even our bodies.  So when we are carrying pride, the load can be quite heavy.   
 
The Little Flower experienced  transferences a lot.  She said God would put her in a dark tunnel so others could have light.  Whenever she was in that dark tunnel she knew that she was going to come out of it so she didn't need to be afraid.  She also knew that whoever she was experiencing this darkness for, whoever's load she was lightening, was going to come out of it, too, because she was interceding and obtaining graces and light for them through her sacrifices.  St. Therese said, "For is there a joy greater than that of suffering out of love for You?  I am in a hole just like that, body and soul.  Ah! What darkness!  However, I am still at peace.  Everything I have, everything I merit, is for the good of the Church and for souls" (Story of a Soul, p. 26, 214, 266).
 
The thing about these transferences that you have to be careful of is that they are very natural so they may not be noticeable; you may not even be aware that they are transferences.  Transferences are usually tailor-made to you.    For example, fatigue-some of us just sort of drag around all of the time.  If there's a transference of fatigue, we may not even recognize it and may not realize that we are to pray.  The only thing we may know is that we're a little more tired than normal, but we underestimate fatigue sometimes.  When we are tired it can really hurt us if it's not taken care of because what does it affect first?  Our prayer.  We cannot pray when we are tired.  We can put in the time praying and fall sound asleep.  We can escape into the TV set, the telephone, our conversations, or our work because if we keep busy, we'll stay awake.  Fatigue can be a tremendous enemy and so God gives these transferences of fatigue to intercessors who will fight it and pray for the graces to counteract it.

Excerpt from Mother Nadine's Interceding with Jesus, p. 50-55.