BY TORSTEN SCHWANKE
DEDICATED TO MILAN
THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD
My son, if you want to know God,
Know who can teach you.
Not the Eastern philosophers,
Not the Western philosophers,
Not the myth-makers
And not the false prophets
Ask for knowledge of God,
But ask Jesus, the Son of God!
Jesus came from heaven
To earth to man,
To reveal the nature of God.
Jesus calls
God his loving Father,
Don't let rebellious women
By rebellious women
Who persist in their sins.
God is love, nothing but love,
But since God's essence is love,
God cannot be but one person,
But the loving Father
Loves the beloved Son
And both love for each other
Is the Person of the Holy Spirit.
The Father is the Ancient of Days,
Snow-white is his head hair and beard,
He sits on the radiant throne,
At His right hand stands
The Son of Man,
And between the Ancient of Days
And the divine Son of Man
Hovering like a dove
The divine love.
Behold, the dove of love
Descends upon the head
Of the pure girl Mary.
The pure girl Mary
Is the woman of revelation,
The eternal Virgin
In the heart of the Trinity.
My son, take hold of Mary's hand,
She will guide you
Into the inner life
Of the Trinitarian Love.
THE PROPHETS
My son, begin to read the Bible
With the Gospel of Jesus.
If you have met Jesus of Nazareth
Have come to know
And received him into yourself,
Do not do as the fools do
Who reject the Old Testament
As the testimony of a vengeful god.
No, you will understand the gospel
Better and deeper understand,
If you study the law of Moses
In view of Christ.
Moses is the greatest prophet,
He points to the prophet
Who is to come,
And that is Jesus, the new Moses.
When you study Moses' books,
study also the prophets.
Do not do as the fools do,
Who accept only
The prophet Isaiah,
Let not the prophet Jeremiah
Of the prophet Jeremiah,
Do not do as the foolish do,
Who would be more chaste
Than the Holy Spirit,
Reject not the prophets
Who in bold erotic images
Speak of the mystical marriage.
If you have studied the prophets,
And not only the great four,
The twelve minor prophets also,
Learn the prayer
From the Psalter of David.
In the Psalms you will find
Thanksgiving and lamentation and petition and praise
And so you become a praying man,
Who by the Holy Spirit
Learned to pray.
Do not spurn the scriptures
of the deuterocanonical books,
And go to the school
Of the Eternal Wisdom,
Learn from Solomon,
But learn also from Jesus Sirach.
If you become a student of wisdom,
You will one day
Be yourself a sage and a teacher.
PRAISE TO THE DIVINE BEAUTY
My son, praise the Lord,
Sing hallelujah, my son
Our praise can
The glory of the Lord
Increase not, for it is perfect,
But it is our salvation
When we sing hallelujah
It is good to give thanks to God
For gifts received.
Better it is to praise God
Because God is so glorious.
When you see beautiful girls
So always remember
How beautiful is the Creator
Of that girl's beauty is.
Look at a beautiful woman,
Today she will seem beautiful,
But tomorrow she'll seem unattractive,
So will her breasts
Will seem splendid to you,
But her bottom too wide,
So she will seem beautiful to you,
But not to your friends.
But the beauty of God
Is beautiful at all times,
Is beautiful in every way,
Is seen by all who behold it,
As beautiful,
Is beautiful in all its parts
And beautiful for ever.
Compared to the divine beauty
All beautiful women are ugly.
When a pretty girl
Delights the man,
How deserving of God's beauty
Enthusiastic praise!
And if the beautiful woman
Will not show thee grace,
Think that the Godhead
In her divine beauty
Wants to be looked at eternally,
To be enjoyed eternally!
So strive diligently, my son,
To the eternal enjoyment
Of the divine beauty!
THE WORSHIP OF GOD
My son, be faithful to the Church
And its holy hierarchy.
Believe in the words of Jesus:
This is my body
And this is my blood!
Receive into your soul
The risen Christ,
That you may live no more,
But Christ in you lives,
Christ in you suffers,
Christ in you dies,
Christ in you goes to Hades,
Christ in you rises,
Christ in you goes to heaven!
Do not follow the fools,
Who mindlessly perform their rites
And know not what they do,
Since they, ungodly sinners
Receive Christ's body
Without conversion and without faith!
Nor follow the other fools,
Who would follow Jesus,
Study his word
And yet do not celebrate communion
With body and blood
And soul and divinity of Christ
And are disobedient
To the words of their Master:
This do in remembrance of me,
My flesh is true meat,
And he that receiveth not the body of the Lord,
hath not the life of Christ in him!
And when ungodly sinners
Offend the Church,
So remain faithful
To the Mother who feeds you
With the manna from heaven,
And join not
In the clamorous chorus of blaspheming tongues,
Who call the Virgin
Christ's bride and betrothed,
A blasphemous whore of Babylon
And a tyranny of antichrist.
Remain faithful to the Church, my son,
And remain faithful to the Eucharist,
Then your eternal life is assured!
FATHER AND MOTHER
My son, do not forget,
Yes, even to old age remember
As your mother sang
At the time of holy Christmas
The sweet nursery rhymes
Of the Christ child!
Remember, my son,
How your mother
Took you to bed
With children's prayers
To the guardian angel of thine,
Of Mary's mother's mantle
And the Christ Child in Paradise!
My son, do not forget
In the noisy hubbub of the world
The doctrine of faith
Of your father,
Who told you of Moses
And the deliverance of Israel
From Egypt's slavery
And how the living God
Burned in the thorn bush,
How the boy David
Defeated the giant Goliath
With the slingshot
And the name of God,
How Abraham was ready
To sacrifice his son,
But God gave instead of the son
A lamb for sacrifice,
And how Joseph the dreamer
Was his father's favourite,
Envied by his brothers.
When your mother dies
Pray for her soul
And look to the heavens
Where she waits for thee.
When your father's
Beard has grown grey
And his body is weary,
Despise not thy father
In the fullness of thy youth,
But make thy father
Joy through thy wisdom.
ORIGIN AND VIRTUE
My son, do not give up one thing,
Remember how in thy infancy
Divided men
Into love and evil,
Always distinguish the spirits
And do not be confused
By the fools who say
In God, evil and good are one.
Decide
At every moment
For good
And oppose evil
And all its appearances!
Wealth or poverty
Of your father,
Whether he counts himself among the bourgeoisie
Or to the lumpenproletariat,
It's all the same to you,
Only always seek the good,
Pure love
And justice.
Do not be deceived
By the poor fools,
Be they rich or be they poor
Who say that money
Alone makes happy.
Seek the happiness of your heart
And the joys
Of a fulfilled life
Not in money,
The false god of the world
But in love alone,
The true God in heaven.
Count yourself among the loving,
Not among the wicked,
Practice love
And always enlarge your heart.
Whether you get money too,
Always be merciful
With the poor,
With the sick,
With the little ones,
With the dying.
No one takes their possessions
Into the hereafter,
What remains in eternity
Is love alone.
OF THE BEAUTIFUL SPEECH
If you want to speak, my son
Speak not with food in your mouth.
When a wise man teaches you
Do not interrupt him
And do not argue with him
In thy childish folly.
Abstain from gossip,
From evil gossip,
Blasphemy of the worst kind
And above all blasphemy.
Let your yes be a yes
And your no a no
And swear not
On your grandmother's bones.
Do not get into the habit of lying,
For the divine truth
Flees from those who love falsehood.
Let thy speeches be intelligible
And not like a tower of Babel
And do not mix all languages
Into an incomprehensible gibberish.
Honour thy mother tongue
And train your language
From the best authors
Of thy fatherland.
Despise no language
Of any people,
For in all the tongues of the nations
Praise to God is heard.
Shun vulgar words
And speak no gutter language,
Tell no filthy jokes.
Above all, avoid swearing!
Decorate your speech
With sayings from the Scriptures,
With verses from the classics
And with rhymes
Of the poets of thy nation.
Remember that for every word
That you speak on earth
You will have to give account to God
In the personal court of the dead.
GRANDFATHER'S WILL
My son, your grandfather dies
In a few moons.
I have carried you
To his armchair.
The grandfather uncorked the bottle
And poured me Spanish red wine
Of the Carinena brand
And said: My dear poet!
Your fellow-livers do not know
That you are a poet of genius.
But not only a true poet,
You are also a true lover of children.
But above all I lament
That the blackest melancholy
And the most idiotic quirk
Makes you helpless again and again,
So that you are then at the mercy
To the devils around you.
Seek support
In your Christian brothers
And in the saving arm
Of divine charity!
My rich experience of life
Wishes you above all
Serenitas, Serenitas!
Serenitas is a young girl
Of seventeen years,
Resembling a fairy,
Resembling the Madonna,
Like a sky
Without clouds,
But full of violins,
Like a hallelujah
At the camp of a dying man.
Further I wish you
Genius creativity,
That you may transform all spiritual wounds
Into poetic pearls.
But I also warn you:
Don't get infatuated with the bad guys,
The cold egoists
With stony hearts,
Who make you sick
And make your life bitter,
So that you wish you were dead
Or rather never be born!
Beware of such snakes!
I have travelled all over the world
And know that some people
Get over life
Through hard-working wine.
AGE AND YOUTH
My son, the merry youth,
They think life is a dance.
They dance drunk
And are drunk with lust.
But if they are pious
They dance for God
Like David before the ark of the covenant.
When I see the young girls
From fourteen years old
To twenty-four years old,
There's no art
To be lovely and pretty.
In my youth I also wanted
To unhinge the world.
To rearrange the world,
I seemed called.
In youth one trusts
Feelings and are in love,
That's what eternal love is,
That lasts six moons at most.
But when old age comes,
My son, the bitter old age
The limbs no longer want,
The body becomes too heavy,
One man's beard turns grey,
The other goes bald,
The teeth have fallen out,
The eyes no longer see clearly,
The soul has conquered
Many terrible wounds,
So the old man takes refuge
Not to the young girls,
The old man would be ridiculous
To jest with foolish girls.
The dignity of old age
Is the experience of life
Or, if God gave it,
The maturity of wisdom.
One surrenders to God's will
And suffers like another man
And already looks out to heaven,
For earth's pleasures are fleeting,
But eternal are the joys of heaven!
AT THE MEAL
Holy ruffian!
What have I seen!
The boy lies at table
And smears his mouth with grease
And wipes his sticky fingers
On his trouser legs.
He greedily grabs
The biggest piece of the cake
And begrudges his brother
The same share.
He spurns the sausage
And throws it to the dog,
Who waits begging under the table.
He throws the noodles around
And there's more under the table
Than on the plate.
He spurns the bread,
He only wants sugar.
He eats with black fingers
With which he digs in the mud,
And licks from the black fingers
The honey.
He jumps up from the table
And lets the parents eat,
But he seeks
The nourishment for dessert.
He lays his head on the table
And lazily shoves
The food from the plate into his mouth.
He shrieks and makes a noise at the table
And quarrels with his brother
And insults his mother,
The food tastes disgusting.
And what happened to the custom
Of the pious Christians,
To pray before eating
And to thank the Creator
And to bless the food
With the sign of the cross?
There goes that custom.
Holy ruffian,
Pray for our children
WHILE DRINKING WINE
My son, take as your example
Only my cultivated friend:
The day passed with work,
With women's quarrels and children's noises,
But the evening with friends
Be devoted to fine wine,
Not cheap vinegar, indeed,
No, the noblest wine
So let us drink and toast
To wine
And the beautiful women.
Then we philosophise
And theologise
And are witty,
One word gives another,
Then we'll part happily,
My friend goes to sleep
Next to his beautiful wife.
My son, promise me
Not to follow my ways
I open night after night
The bottle of the same wine
And drink the bottle empty
And take my morphine
And stagger drunk
Into my lonely bed.
Do as the French do,
My son, they pour
With a delicious feast
A good drop of wine,
The men of France drink
The unmixed wine,
The French women drink
The wine mixed with water.
They enjoy the taste
Of the good wine
In conviviality
Over a delicious roast
And finally with bread and cheese.
Then the bottle is
Closed again.
Instead, there's café.
Don't join the crowd
Of the drunkards who, drunk
Stripped of all shame and manners
Fall into the laps of strumpets.
A glass of good red wine, my son,
Prolongs your life
And increases your lust for life.
HOSPITALITY
My son, be hospitable,
For many a man has entertained
Entertained angels
Without knowing it.
When your friend in his need
Seeks refuge with you
From great lamentation of soul,
Do not close your heart
Then invite him into your home
And let him enjoy your cake
And your hot coffee,
Then take him for a walk
And show him your garden,
Then invite him in the evening
To a roast duck
And fetch from your cellar
The very best wine.
Offer him a clean bed
In your guest room
And lay him a towel
In case he wants a bath in the morning.
In the morning greet him cheerfully
And hand him steaming buns
And a boiled egg
And the best lime blossom honey.
Then bless him and say:
My best friend you are,
I cherish the conversations with you,
Though you're full of gloom
God has given you wisdom.
My son, I warn you,
Don't do as those people do
Who offer the guest
In the hot summer
A cup of cool water
And turn their backs on the guest
His back and keep him silent,
He will leave the house
And shake the dust from her threshold
From his sandals
And say: These people
Want to know nothing of God,
So shall they remain
Ignorant as fools!
My son, your guest
Is sometimes a beggar,
But it may be
It is Jesus Christ himself
And beseeches thee
For your mercy.
OF THE SOCIAL GAMES
My son, when you play chess
You must know
That within the limits of the game
You may take the queen.
I have no desire in life
To take a queen,
But I play chess,
Then it's my pleasure
To take the enemy queen.
When you play with your grandmother
The game as man shall not fret,
The so-called game of goose,
When your grandmother gets up
To pour herself tea,
So cheat not at the game.
The victory will only give you joy,
When you win regular.
When you play cards with your friend,
Do not deal the cards so,
That you have all the strong cards
And he all the weak cards.
For if your victory
Is a foregone conclusion,
Then where is the excitement of the game?
If you lose in the game,
So don't start crying
Or get angry
And kick your feet
Against the table.
Stay cheerful and remember:
He who is lucky at cards
You're unlucky in love.
But I must warn you,
That you don't play
Playing for money,
For there was a man I knew
Who gambled away all his money
And had no place to live
And had to beg his daily bread
Begging from stingy people.
HOW A BELOVED SHOULD BE BUILT
My son, if you had a mistress
In your wild youth
To be your comrade,
Then make it so,
As your mother and I
Loved each other in youth.
When you see the beautiful woman
For the first time,
She seems to you a goddess,
A white goddess of light.
Then you see her beauty,
You fall in love with her body
Her kissable lips,
Her trembling bosom,
You see her red dress
And her white skin,
You love her black hair
And her sea-blue eyes.
Then her name will be
The most beautiful name in the world,
The place where she was born
Will be your capital of love.
By her hand you'll discover
The north with its sea,
The east with its wheat fields,
The south with its vineyards,
And she will open up the world to you,
The beautiful creation of God.
When you taste the delights
Of physical love
With your beloved,
Oh, you will remember
When your beloved dies,
You will dream of it
In weary old age.
But if you seek God,
If your beloved seeks not God,
So the bed will not unite you.
True love between man and woman
Needs a third between,
Namely, the Cupid of God.
It is better, my son,
To wait in your youth
Till you take a pious wife
To be thy everlasting wife.
FROM SEXUAL INTERCOURSE
My son, in God's ways
Shall a man love a woman,
One and only this one
And that one all his life.
When you have tested each other
And before God's face
To be true to each other,
Your marriage is a sacrament
Which becomes valid,
When you have intercourse
Sexual intercourse
And are open
To fertility
And are willing
To raise children.
Then the sexual act
The summit of devotion
Of one human being to another,
Not the selfish
Satisfaction of desires,
but the giving of love
And wholehearted devotion.
Then your sexuality becomes
Becomes the place of the Creator,
As the Creator in union
With the creative spouses
Creates a new life.
If, however, far
From the ways of God
The sexuality of man
The sexuality of woman
Used for the satisfaction
Own desires,
When heart and mind
And fidelity and God
Are not involved in the act,
Then sexual intercourse
Harmful to the soul of man,
Then the heart is wounded
And man in the course of time
Will be incapable of love,
To trust and to be faithful.
Then sexuality,
The sacred gift of the Creator,
Through man's selfishness
A destructive force
And man's heart is left behind
As the ruins of a ruin.
FROM BATHING
When you are sad, my son
Pray and pray to God
That he may comfort thee,
Seek comfort in the psalms.
If that does not help,
Then take a hot bath.
Where is a security
As in the womb,
As in the amniotic fluid of a uterus,
Than in the bath?
Lie back
Into the womb of the mother,
In the warm amniotic fluid,
And enjoy the peace.
Rinse away the dust of everyday life
And the hostility of men
In the bath from you.
Take fragrant bath oils
Of lavender or fir
And enjoy the fragrance
Of the steaming bath.
When I relax in the bath
Relax from the toils of everyday life,
I like to read a book in the bath
On the edge of the tub
A cup of apple juice
And let yourself drift
In the flowing river of time.
Even if you are tired of reading
Tired of reading
So meditate in the tub
The holy rosary.
Mary in Latin means
The seas. Mary knows
How good a child feels
In the moist womb.
When you murmur Hail Mary
In the tub,
Remember you are in the womb
Of the holy mother of God
All the time on earth,
Until the hour of your death
She gives you birth to eternal life.
FROM SLEEP
My son, I know that little children
Don't like to go to bed,
They want it to be always day
And always happy play.
But when you get to old age
So you know how to appreciate sleep.
If then you cannot sleep,
So you are melancholy in the day,
Sullen and tormented.
How longs a man
A man full of sorrow
For a deep sleep!
Oh, when love torments you
And life torments you,
How you long for sleep!
Oh, when you then
The soul's consolation in sleep seek,
But still awake in sleep
And dream a muddled tale,
In dreams too you are spurned,
Suffering loss in your dreams
And in dreams are pursued
By enemies and monsters,
You long for a dreamless sleep
A dreamless sleep.
Yea, when thou art
Sick with madness,
Then the physicians
There's no other way to help you
But to put you into a deep sleep
With morphine for the soul.
Then you are halfway through your life
In deep sleep almost like a dead man.
And at last, when old age
Makes life repugnant to you,
You will see the great sleep,
The brother of sleep, death,
Eternal rest.
But you, son, jump up
Out of your little bed
And jump about merrily
And be merry in your childhood,
Enthusiastic in your youth.
FROM THE FOOTBALL
My son, the boys
Love the game of football.
The little boys
Like to sit on your lap
And have books read to them,
But soon they want to go out
Into the garden and play ball.
Now, the boy who plays alone,
Throws the ball against the wall
And catches it again.
The boy thinks to himself,
The sun is a football
And God the Father is playing
With the archangel Michael
Football with the sun.
Little Therese of Lisieux
Said to the boy Jesus:
I want to be your ball,
And if you want to play with me
Then I'm always ready,
And if you don't feel like it any more
And leave the ball in the corner,
I'll be happy to do it.
Blessed Pope John Paul
As a young priest
Played ball with the boys.
Today, when football players
From Brazil score a goal
They tear off their jerseys
And on the vest
It clearly reads:
Jesus is Lord!
A boy wants the ball
Into the goal,
Your life has a goal
The ball of your life
You shoot into heaven's goal!
DEALING WITH ENEMIES
My son, he who has become a Christian
Has made enemies of Christ.
I had just converted
To the living Christ,
When an occultist kicked me
And set his black poodle on me
And shook on me
The ashes of his cigarette
And said: Leave me alone
With your idol, this weakling,
Your godforsaken god!
When your mother fell ill
I met a madman,
Who asked me for the Bible,
The Apocalypse,
He wanted to honour the Antichrist.
He'd rather meet the devil
Than meet God,
Rather go to hell
Than to heaven.
He barked at me,
His face grimaced,
I felt as if his mouth
Frogs were jumping out of his mouth.
I met people,
Who were hostile to me.
They thought I was their enemy,
Though I promised them
The wind at my back from God.
They spoke ill of me
And took away the dearest thing
That I had on earth.
I knew a woman,
She was very beautiful, yes, lovely.
She was very gentle and modest.
So I began to love her,
I did everything for her love,
Helped her in every way,
showered her with gifts,
Instructed her in the faith,
Took care of her children.
But she turned
To occult demons
And rejected me
And tore my heart apart
And made my life bitter,
That I wished
Never to have been born!
God bless all my enemies!
FROM MONEY
My son, you are wrong,
If you think a lot of money
That can make you happy.
I knew a woman
Who sent her son
Who was sick with grief
A bank note with the words:
Here's a happiness maker!
But the son missed
Not material gifts,
But merciful love.
I knew a man,
Who spent his life
Saving money.
He made the money work
And let the money multiply.
In his old age he was rich,
He wanted to enjoy his wealth
And travel the world,
But God let him die.
I know a woman
Who's a millionaire
She had herself sterilised.
Mother of sterilisation,
That's what they call this mother.
She enjoyed with her husband
The great wealth,
But they had no children.
But when old age approached,
They said one evening over wine
It would be nice to have children.
So they took from a poor man
His only darling away.
The state helped the rich,
For it was the state that thought:
Where there is much money,
There the children do well.
The poor man had given love,
Fatherly and motherly love.
But the millionaires
Spoiled the children
With many material gifts.
Thus they spoiled
The poor man's favourite,
That he trusted not in God alone
He trusted not in God alone, but in money.
Jesus says: How hard it is
For millionaires to get to heaven!
Rather a loaded camel goes
Through the eye of a needle!
ON THE TREATMENT OF PROPERTY
My son, if you own a house
Do not fill your house
With all manner of useless trinkets.
I know an old man,
Who owned a big house,
That he stuffed to the top
With documents
Of his political work,
With books of all sorts,
Books, from the cellar
Up to the roof,
With all manner of trinkets and ornaments
As shells and owls,
Buddhas and other idols,
water buffaloes and dragons,
Models of fishing boats,
songbirds and aquariums,
And over it all lay
The invincible dust.
Then God sent the man
An incurable disease
And the man prepared
For death.
He cleared out his house
And threw away the documents
Of his political life's work
And gave away all the books
And threw away the Buddhas
And the water buffaloes and dragons.
In the face of death
All the beautiful possessions
Seemed like trash and rubbish.
If you own a house
My son, let your house
A little domestic church.
Have an altar in your house
With an image of the Blessed Virgin
And an image of the Divine Boy.
Let from your house
Prayers ascend to God.
Let your house
Be a temple of Solomon.
Then in your house dwells
With you the divine wisdom,
Then you possess a treasure
Which thou wilt not lose in death.
Have property in peace, my son,
But be poor in the sight of God
And rely on the grace of God alone!
HOW TO ACQUIRE A HOUSE
My son, if you make an inheritance
Of a hundred thousand silver coins,
Then seek for thee in the fairest city
Of the German fatherland
A house in which thou wilt dwell.
Watch for the signs of God!
When you enter the empty house
And outside the balcony
The turtledoves are singing
And close by
The church bells are ringing,
Then settle down there.
If you want to live with your wife and child
In a house of your own,
Be prepared for work.
You must mow the lawn
And tend the garden beds,
You must repair the house roof
And terrace and balcony.
If you have gainful employment
You've got to use your hard-earned holiday
To work
On the renovation of the house.
If you are willing to do so
Then go to the previous owner
And sign a contract.
Remember that the state
Will demand taxes from you
For your house property.
Pay the taxes on time!
When the state asks the citizens
About their house property,
Give them the information they want!
The poor prophet Jeremiah
Saw Israel depart
Into Babylonian captivity,
Then the Lord said to Jeremiah:
Buy a field!
Sign a contract of sale!
For seventy years
The reign of Babylon.
Pray for the welfare of the city
In which you dwell.
For if your homeland prosper
So will it be well with thee.
FROM THE HORSES
My son, if you love a woman,
Because she is lovely and charming,
Know that women have desires
And one day she will say:
Give me for Christmas
A pony! Give me, my friend
This Tinker pony, I want!
I have already bought
The riding helmet and the boots
And the saddle too,
I want to use my savings
To buy a pasture
Tinker ponies are the horses
Of the Irish tinker.
They have no noble pedigree,
But some breeders try
To give them a nobility
To give them a nobility after the fact.
But look at that Tinker pony,
There that certain Tinker pony
With the name Leila,
What a mane!
What a powerful body!
What a gallop!
What a snorting of the nostrils!
Think what bliss it would be
To sit Leila in the saddle
And with your manly thighs
To press her quivering flanks!
Oh, to ride Leila once!
You dream of it day and night!
But do you tell this to the woman,
Thus speaks the chaste lady:
Mare and stallion,
Those are vulgar words!
To ride a mare,
That's vulgar speech!
Well, if you can't buy Leila
Acquire Leila with your fortune,
Go to the duke of your duchy
And look at the steeds,
His noble steeds,
Look at the young
Princesses of thy city,
How they ride dressage
How they do tricks
On the back of the steed!
OF HOLY MATRIMONY
If thou wilt marry, my son,
Prepare for it,
By living before marriage
Abstain
And pray: Lord, on earth
Somewhere my wife already lives,
Please bring her to me
When you find the wife of your heart,
In chaste friendship
Know each other deeper and deeper
And if she continues to please you,
Decide
In your free will
To an exclusive bond,
A lifelong bond,
And ask holy mother church
For God's blessing.
When you confer the sacrament of matrimony
To one another,
Give each other God's love
Let the husband love his wife
As Christ loves his church
In total devotion
And faithfulness unto death.
Let the wife honour her husband
As head of the family,
As the Church calls Christ her head.
To the sacrament of marriage
Intercourse is part of it,
But only those forms of intercourse
Which can beget children.
Be ready for children!
Do not artificially prevent fertility
And do not abort embryos!
For as the father loves the son
And as the Son loves the Father
And from the Father and the Son proceed
The Holy Spirit,
So let the man love the woman
And woman love man
And from man and woman comes
The child according to God's creative will.
But if you want to become a priest,
My son, live celibate
And be wedded to the love of God
In a lifelong mystical marriage!
ON THE UPBRINGING OF CHILDREN
My son, the education
Of a child begins
In the womb of the mother.
When the mother is pregnant
Pray for the child
And bless mother and child.
Let the mother hear holy music,
Not unholy noise,
And say to her womb:
You are welcome to me!
When the child is born,
Let the mother lay it down
Between her breasts
And nurse it long
At her milky breasts,
So the child learns
The basic trust,
Social skills
And the intelligence of the brain.
Teach the child love
To the child's angels
And to the Mother of God
And to the Child Jesus
Bless the child
With consecrated water,
Draw the cross
On the child's bed
Sing the child to sleep
And do not let him sleep alone,
But in the mother's room.
Teach the child
The mother tongue
And teach him to walk
And give the child
Time, attention, tenderness.
Introduce the child soon
Into the wonderful world
Of the fine arts!
Read to your child
Good books
And sing sacred songs
And show him beautiful pictures.
In the first three years
The character of the child
Is essentially established.
ABOUT FRIENDSHIP
My son, if you seek friends
Do not do as the foolish do
Who make friends indiscriminately,
Which are shallow and empty.
For the wicked has many friends,
When he is healthy and rich,
But when he is sick and miserable,
He has scarcely one friend.
Let your friendship
Jesus be present
And seek faithful friends,
Who will help you to salvation.
If you find among the Catholics
No believing friends,
Do not spurn the friendship
Of the zealous Protestants.
Do not expect from your friend
That he will always flatter thee,
But be ready to hear from him
The truth, spoken in love.
Remember, my son,
When all your friends leave you
One friend will always be with you
If Jesus is your friend.
Do not despair and do not become discouraged,
When things happen to you
Like other friends of Jesus.
For poor Lazarus
Was a beloved friend of the Lord,
He was poor and miserable,
Mocked by the rich,
Full of boils,
The dogs licked his wounds,
But Jesus was his friend.
Teresa of Avila rode through Spain,
to found monasteries for Jesus,
She fell off her horse and into the mud,
Then she saw Jesus and said to him:
O Lord, now I know
Why you have so few friends,
If this is how you treat your friends!
Above all the friendship of thy friends
Be to thee the friendship of God,
My son, for it is an everlasting friendship,
That lasts beyond death.
OF FORGIVENESS
My son, if you have hurt anyone,
Ask his forgiveness.
But never forget
What you do to a man
By asking his forgiveness,
For this is often a difficult task
And costs much self-conquest.
The closer you come to God, my son,
The more clearly you see
Your own transgressions.
Do not be too proud,
To ask the merciful Saviour
Daily for forgiveness!
Heroically overcome
Overcome your inner bastard
And bow before God
In the sacrament of confession
And confess all your sins,
Jesus wants to set you free
From all the chains of guilt
And give you new strength
To a holy life.
Remember, if God
Forgives you so willingly
Your heavy debts
And all offences
Against divine love,
Then you too should be willing
To forgive those
Who have offended thee.
Simon Peter asked the Lord:
Shall I forgive seven times?
But Jesus said to his friend:
Forgive seventy times seven times!
When people hurt you,
That thou art sick for life,
Forgive again and again,
At every daily Our Father
Prayed at daily mass,
Forgive those who have offended you
And hurt you for life,
Forgive them until they die
And beyond their death forgive them!
And when the Mother of God
Imposes crosses upon thee
Heavy and deep as the sea
Forgive the beloved!
HOW TO SEEK WISDOM
My son, if you want to become wise,
Ask God for the gift of wisdom.
Not in great libraries,
But in prayer
Is the source of wisdom.
If you desire wisdom from God,
Prepare thyself,
To go into the dark night,
For divine wisdom
Is poured into thee,
When you hang on the cross!
If you ask for a book,
For a trustworthy teacher,
I refer thee
To the book of books.
In the study of the Scriptures
And in ruminating
Of the divine revelation,
In contemplating and meditating
The teachings of Jesus and the prophets
Is the divine wisdom hidden.
How the Scriptures are to be understood,
Ask not conflicting sects,
But to the chair of the Church.
Ask St. Augustine
And the angelic Doctor Thomas,
Read the letters of the popes.
If you have thus built a foundation
Build on it, build on it,
By reading the philosophers,
Plato and Aristotle,
Pre-Socratics, Stoics, Epicureans.
Ask the Chinese sages
And the Indian theosophists,
The Egyptian wisdom teachers
And the German poets and thinkers.
But do not be confused
By the diversity of opinions
And do not believe like the fools,
That all opinions are equally true,
But measure the teaching of the teachers
By the holy scripture
And the teaching of the holy church.
OF THE ART OF THE DOCTORS
My son, when you are ill
You will appreciate the healing art of doctors.
Do not overestimate the doctor,
But do not underestimate him either.
Do not do as the fools do,
They think health
For the highest good.
Health is a great good,
But the highest good is
The eternal bliss of the soul.
Do not worship the doctor
As a god in a white dress
And do not sacrifice your whole life
For the health of the body.
Do not believe in the religion of health,
In the procession of doctors
And the altar boys of the nurses
And the mumbo-jumbo
Of incomprehensible technical terms.
But don't do it like those fools either,
Who reject the science
And the healing art of doctors
And turn alone
To scents of flowers,
To cosmic energies,
To shamans and charlatans
And to the sorcery of witches
And in the power of precious stones
And such magical superstitions.
God gives the doctors the wisdom
And nature gives the substances
For the medicines.
Ask God for healing,
Ask God to bless
For your medicines,
Thank God for healing.
But if you suffer
And God does not hear your prayer
For healing is not heard,
Don't despair of God
Unite your suffering
With the sufferings of Christ on the cross,
So you will save souls
And convert hardened sinners!
OF ASTROLOGY
My son, be believing
And not superstitious!
Astrology was invented
By the pagan Chaldeans.
At that time they defined the constellations,
Which today are quite different.
The stars were thought to be gods
And lords of fate.
In those days the magicians followed
A new star
And came to the infant Jesus,
The human wisdom of God,
And worshipped Jesus
As Father of Lights
And Lord of Providence.
The foolish say,
Thomas Aquinas
Also claimed an influence
Of the stars on the heart.
But the cosmology
Of the Catholic Middle Ages
Conceived of heaven
Above the earth as a dome,
The stars hung on spherical shells.
And just as the cheerful weather
Makes a good mood
And the dull November weather
Makes melancholy,
So the angelic Thomas imagined
The influence of the stars
On the inclination of the heart.
But the cosmos today
More familiar to astronomers,
Astrology is obsolete,
Is the superstition of the people.
Look into the Holy Scriptures,
You'll find scorn and derision
For foolish superstitions
In the fate-determining stars.
Do not go to soothsayers,
Do not go to magicians and witches
But lay down your life
And all your fate
Into the hands of Jesus and say:
Merciful Jesus,
I trust in you!
OF THE MUSIC
My son, concerning music
I will not tell you
What my mother would tell you
Of Bach's Christmas Oratorio
And Mozart's Requiem.
When your mother
Was pregnant with you
She used to go to the African
From the Ivory Coast,
To learn to play the drums.
You learned with the heartbeat
Of your mother
The joyous drumming of Africa.
And when your mother died
And her body lay laid out
In the mortuary chapel,
There were Africans drumming
In her honour
Like soldiers
Of an African queen.
Some bigots complain,
When in church
In the church.
But I know that in Africa
At Holy Mass
The drums are beating
To Kyrie and Gloria,
To Sanctus and Agnus Dei,
And the bishop
With the thurible
Comes to the beat of the drums
Dancing into the church.
If you are lovesick
My son, take comfort
The music that pleases you,
Be it Hallelujah
Or Ave, Ave, Ave Maria.
Only turn away the barbarians from you,
Whose music is a hellish din
In honour of Satan.
When the angels make music
For the joy of the angels,
They play Mozart's music.
When the angels make music
For the glory of God,
Play Johann Sebastian Bach.
EMPEROR BY THE GRACE OF GOD
My son, the Emperor,
Our old emperor is dead!
His Imperial Highness
Otto of Habsburg
Had abdicated the throne
And yet he remained Emperor
By the grace of God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
Said the cardinal
In the cathedral of St. Stephen the King.
For His Imperial Highness
Has fought politically
For peace in Europe,
For peace in the world.
He rejoiced like a king,
When from Hungary and Austria
And from all the banks of the Danube
The pious Catholics came
To the Magna Mater Austriae.
He fought politically for it,
That the states of Europe
Confess in their constitution
Responsibility before God.
Europe, the Occident,
Is nothing without its soul,
Her soul is Christianity.
To this end the Emperor concluded
A covenant of friendship
With the Muslim states,
Was a member
Of the Muslim Academy,
For while the atheists
In the Occident deny
The responsibility before God,
Latin Americans
Latin Americans
And the Muslim peoples.
Our old emperor is dead,
God save our old Emperor!
The Magna Mater Austriae
Protect the House of Austria!
Mary of Medjugorje
Bless the Emperor's granddaughter,
Her Imperial Highness
Milona of Medjugorje!
DEMOCRACY
My son, the Holy Mother Church
Can work in every form of government,
As long as freedom of religion
Is granted by the authorities.
The freedom of man is incompatible
With the ideological dictatorships
Of National Socialism
And Communism.
But Pope Pius the Twelfth
Said: Democracy is as good
as the people are good.
Every people in a democracy
Has the government it deserves.
However, in this apocalyptic time
Of the great apostasy
The virtue of the people
Has been ruined by the ideologues
Of hedonism and nihilism,
Of atheistic materialism
And of occult spiritualism.
So too are the governments
Of the bourgeois democracies
In the Western Occident
Are promoters of atheism,
Of materialism
And Occult Spiritism.
A renewal of democracy
Can only come
From the evangelisation of the peoples,
From the new evangelisation
Of lukewarm Christendom.
However, the immaculate one prophesied:
The future kings
Will be servants
Of the Holy Mother Church!
The truth, however, my son,
Is revealed by God
And is not subject
To the opinions of the masses.
The truth
Is not voted on.
Christ is appointed by God
King of all nations.
THE POOR
My son, where are the treasures
Of Holy Mother Church?
Behold, these are the poor!
These are the poorest of the poor,
Who live in rubbish dumps,
Who feed on the refuse of the rich,
Who lie in the gutters of the streets,
Brushing their teeth with sewage,
Living in tin shacks
And don't know what to eat tomorrow,
These are the sick,
Suffering from leprosy
Or the deadly cancer
Or of the epidemics,
These are the children,
Who work in the quarries,
Children who have to live
In the prostitutes' quarters,
These are the unborn children
Who are threatened with death
By the child murderers,
These are the embryos
To be cannibalised
For medical purposes
And to breed the superhuman,
These are the drunkards
Who live among empty bottles,
These are the drug addicts
Who destroy their brains,
These are the prostitutes
And the slaves!
My son, when Jesus comes,
He will not side
On the side of the oppressors,
But on the side
The poor, the oppressed.
But do not follow the bad guys,
Who give no bread to the poor,
But put weapons in their hands.
Not revolutionary hatred
Is God's answer to poverty,
But only
Merciful love!
VIRTUE
My son, love virtue!
Those times when no one speaks of virtue,
The artists do not praise virtue,
Those are decadent times,
They are doomed.
There are pagans
Who are generous
And out of a generous heart
Give their money to the poor,
That is a moral virtue.
But he who is enlightened by God
In a Christian way
Is generous,
He feeds the hungry,
Clothes the naked,
Comforts those who mourn,
Visits the sick
And is friend to the lonely
And serves in the people
God incarnate.
There are pagans who are brave,
Who climb the Himalayas
Or explore the North Pole,
It is very dangerous,
But they undertake it
For the sake of glory.
But people who are enlightened by God
And in a Christian way
Have the virtue of courage,
They go to the death camp
And jest:
Even here I can testify to Jesus!
They go for other people
Voluntarily into the furnace of death
And die smiling
With the name of Mary on their lips.
And there are pagans
Who have great worldly wisdom
And are very well read.
But the divine wisdom
Is poured into you
In the dark night
In the marriage bed of the cross!