Following Jesus Christ according to St. Urszula Ledóchowska

Abstract

Following Jesus is understood as participation in the holiness of God. Man is bound with God through love, through life that is His life, suffering with Him and being a apostle. St. Urszula Ledóchowska realised all this in her life by imitating the earthly traits of God-Man. It is with profound commitment that she sought to worship God and before the tabernacle, where he asked God's permission to participate in the virtues of the Most Holy Heart, i.e. love, meekness, and humbleness. It is before the tabernacle that she verified her indignity in the face of the perfect God, and where she regained her strength while immersed in prayer. She worshipped God in all forms of her religious life, especially in obedience to God's will. She paid more attention to Christ's poverty and admired God who the Second Person of the Holy Trinity agreed to be poor, that is, to suffer hunger and homelessness. St. Urszula followed Christ in poverty; she formed her sisters to live in poverty and entreated them to keep poverty in the congregation.

She worshipped and imitated the Most Holy Heart of Dying Jesus in His love, meekness, purity, and humbleness. In relationship with Him she gave love to God and people, claiming that each love bound with the Heart of Jesus was pure. The privileged motive in the Saint's imitation was the suffering of Christ's Heart at the moment when He offered Himself to God as an offering to the sins of people and the world. On the one hand Ledóchowska co-suffered with Jesus and wished to recompense His suffering, and on the other hand she joined them. In relation with the salvific suffering of Christ she treated each human suffering as His sacramental presence.

The fact that she imitated Jesus Christ and modelled her life on Him transformed her and made her come closer to Him and identify herself with His life. She bore it always in her mind not to waste the grace of His presence and wished to imitate Him all the time. Thereby she was made able to contemplate His holiness and to live His life.