My brothers and sisters, my dearest friends, think again and again on this: God has ruled over all things in heaven and earth from the beginning of time; then reflect on why and for what purpose he chose each one of us to be created in his own image and likeness. In this world of perils and hardship if we do not recognize the Lord as our Creator, there would be no benefit in our being born or in our continued existence. We have come into the world by God's grace; by that same grace we have received baptism, entrance into the Church, and the honor of being called Christians. Yet what good will this do us if we are Christians in name alone and not in fact? We would have come into the world for nothing, we would have entered the Church for nothing, and we would have betrayed even God and His grace. It would be better never to have been born than to receive the grace of God and then to sin against Him.
Look at the farmer who cultivates his rice field. In season he plows, then fertilizes the earth; never counting the cost, he labors under the sun to nurture the seed he has planted. When harvest time comes and the rice crop is abundant, forgetting his labor and sweat, he rejoices with an exultant heart. But if the crop is sparse and there is nothing but straw and husks, the farmer broods over his toil and sweat and turns his back on that field with a disgust that is all the greater the harder he has toiled.
The Lord is like a farmer and we are the field of rice that He fertilizes with His grace and by the mystery of the Incarnation and the redemption irrigates with His blood, in order that we will grow and reach maturity. When harvest time comes, the day of judgment, those who have grown in maturity in the grace of God will find the joy of adopted children in the kingdom of heaven; those who have not grown in maturity will become God's enemies and, even though they were once His children, they will be punished according to their deeds for all eternity.
Dearest brothers and sisters: when He was in the world the Lord Jesus bore countless sorrows and by His passion and death founded His Church; now He gives it increase through the sufferings of His faithful. Now matter how fiercely the powers of this world oppress and oppose the Church, they will never bring it down. Ever since His ascension and from the time of the apostles to the present, the Lord Jesus has made His Church grow even in the midst of tribulation.
For the last fifty or sixty years, ever since the coming of the Church to our own land of Korea, the faithful have suffered persecution over and over again. Persecution still rages and as a result many who are friends in the household of faith, myself among them, have been thrown into prison and like you are experiencing severe distress. Because we have the one Body, should not our hearts be grieved for the members who are suffering? Because of the human ties that bind us, should we not feel deeply the pain of our separation?
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