There is today extensive confusion about salvation. Some Protestants ask “Have you been saved?” and then offer their own new formulas for salvation. Many Catholics are ignorant of the Church’s teachings on salvation basics and have little interest in the matter. Other Christians assume everyone goes to Heaven no matter what they do with their lives.  In his messages, the Father focuses on the path to salvation. He reminds us of the constant teaching of the Church on salvation but also takes us back to the original proclamation of the New Testament on salvation that is all but forgotten today. In this original proclamation, salvation is Father-driven, Father-oriented and Father-facing. This original proclamation will appear astonishing to those who have not paid attention to the actual texts.  It is also exhilarating as we shall see.  

Towards the end of the messages, as they move to a crescendo, the Father makes a startling promise, what we might call the Great Promise:

ALL THOSE WHO CALL ME BY THE NAME OF FATHER, EVEN IF ONLY ONCE, WILL NOT PERISH, BUT WILL BE SURE OF THEIR ETERNAL LIFE AMONG THE CHOSEN ONES.

At first blush, this Promise seems both shocking to the Christian mind and too good to be true. What about Jesus we ask? Or the Holy Spirit? What about the sacraments? The Church? Our moral lives? Our perseverance to the end?

But, as we shall see, the Promise includes and subsumes all of the above. And it derives entirely from what we read in Scripture.

Concerning its scriptural roots, consider this fundamentally important passage:

“Now this is eternal life, that they should know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ.” (John 17:3)

Eternal life is knowing “the only true God” which in this verse refers to the Father. In knowing him, we know him as the one who sent Jesus. He sent Jesus because HE, the Father, “so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.” It is the Father from whom salvation originates and it is to the Father that we direct our lives.

But we can do all of this only through Jesus. Jean Galot points out that “The dialogue [in John 8:34-36] shows that only acceptance of Jesus opens the way to authentic sonship of the Father: those who want to kill Jesus have the devil as their father (cf. John 8:44). To acknowledge the Father therefore essentially means to acknowledge the Father of Jesus.”1

In fact, the Father specifically states to Mother Eugenia that we can only become children through Jesus: “I sent My Son …  Through Him I adopted you in My infinite love, as real children.”

And we can also only do this in the Holy Spirit. Recall those dramatic verses from Galatians and Romans. “As proof that you are children, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying out, ‘Abba, Father!’” (Galatians 4:6). “For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received a spirit of adoption, through which we cry, “Abba, Father!”” (Romans 8:14-15). The central act of BEING a Christian is “crying out, ‘Abba, Father!’” – namely calling God “BY THE NAME OF FATHER.”

What is staggering in the epistles is the announcement that we are truly Christians only if we call God Father! In the crucial verses from Galatians and Romans, we are shown believers “crying out, Abba, Father!’”  We are told that this affirmation of the Father constitutes “proof” that we are truly “children” of God: and therefore his heirs who have “eternal life”: “So you are no longer a slave but a child, and if a child then also an heir, through God.” (Galatians 4:7). This is exactly what we are told in the Promise: “ALL THOSE WHO CALL ME BY THE NAME OF FATHER … WILL NOT PERISH” –  i.e., those who are ““crying out, Abba, Father!’” who “know you, the only true God” have “eternal life” because you are “if a child then also an heir, through God.” There is knowing – knowing God by the name of Father –  and there is acting – calling out to him as Father.

We are able to call God “BY THE NAME OF FATHER” only because of the Holy Spirit. This is pointed out too by the Father: “I have shown you that My Son Jesus represents Me among men, and that, through Him, I live constantly among them, I also want to show you that I come among you through My Holy Spirit.”

According to the New Testament, there is something profoundly mysterious about “THE NAME OF FATHER”. Jesus says: “Call no one on earth your father; you have but one Father in heaven.” (Matthew 23:9). St. Paul later says, “I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named.” (Ephesians 3:14-15). “Call no one … but …..” “Named.” All earthly fatherhood and parenthood derive from the Father and Jesus tells us that we should use the word “father” only analogically in our everyday use. “If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him.” (Matthew 7:11).  The essence and fullness of fatherhood, infinitely perfect fatherhood, is found only in God the Father. This is what we recognize when we call God Father in the sense that Jesus taught it. And we are able to do this only because “God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying out, ‘Abba, Father!’” The mystery about “THE NAME OF FATHER” is a mystery of the infinite love that is God, of a love that desires our eternal union with him.

A Return to the Faith of our Fathers

What is so important about the Great Promise is the fact that it brings the Father to the center stage of salvation which is what we see portrayed in the New Testament. A dramatic divine intervention was required to get us back to the path to the starting-point of salvation laid out in Scripture. This starting-point is the call to Abba we find in Romans and Galatians. Jean Galot writes, “Theology reflects life. It reaps the effects of the abundance or meagerness of this life in its various aspects. The name “Abba” that enthralled the first Christians has become a memory recorded in the letters of Paul, a testimony from the past that is too little echoed or shared in by the prayer of Christians today. … Paul presents the invocation ‘Abba’ as the sign of the Christian’s divine sonship: ‘As proof that you are his sons …’ In other words, the specifically Christian personality is defined by its relationship to the Father. This truth is guaranteed by the testimony of the Spirit.”2

There is more to come in Scripture as we come face to face with this Promise of the Father in key biblical passages.

We already saw in Ephesians 1:3 that it is the Father who chose us in Christ from all eternity. Colossians 1:12-13 tells us that the Father “delivered us from the power of darkness” and made us “fit to share in the inheritance of the holy ones in light.” 1 Corinthians 8:6 says “there is one God, the Father, from whom all things are and for whom we exist.”

It is the Father who is driving the salvific plan. Again, we see in 1 Peter 1:3-4: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who in his great mercy gave us a new birth to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you who by the power of God are safeguarded through faith, to a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the final time.”

In short, in his “great mercy” the Father not only gives us “an inheritance that is imperishable” but also safeguards our inheritance for us: it iskept in heaven for you who by the power of God are safeguarded through faith.” This is what is echoed in the Promise: “WILL BE SURE OF THEIR ETERNAL LIFE AMONG THE CHOSEN ONES.” “SURE” because “he destined us for adoption to himself through Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 1:4) and, as we see in Romans 8:30, “And those he predestined he also called; and those he called he also justified; and those he justified he also glorified.”

In one of the most moving passages of all, the Father says:

I am your Father! Is it possible that, having called Me your Father and having shown your love for Me, you could find in Me such a hard and insensitive heart as to let you perish? No, no, do not believe it! I am the best of Fathers! I know My creatures’ weaknesses! Come to Me, come with confidence and love! I will forgive you after you have repented. Even if your sins were as repulsive as mud, your confidence and your love will make Me forget them, so you will not be judged! I am just, it is true, but love pays for everything!

In other words, your “inheritance is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading” and it is “kept in heaven for you who by the power of God are safeguarded through faith.”

Not a Blank Check But a Promissory Note

But the Great Promise is applicable only if we turn to God and cooperate with the grace he offer us. There is no substitute for repentance and continuing conversion. Turning to our earlier question about the commandments, the sacraments and the Church, we find that these are all incorporated in the messages.

The Great Promise of the Father must be seen in the light of all his other exhortations. For instance, he says:

However, what I do require is the faithful observance of the commandments I gave the Church, so that you will be rational creatures and will not be like animals because of your lack of discipline and your evil inclinations, so that you will preserve the treasure which is the soul I gave you, clothed in the fullness of its divine beauty! Then, according to My desire, do what I have already instructed you to do: honor Me with a special devotion.

With My Son Jesus I led a life of sacrifice and work. I received His prayers, that man might have a clearly indicated path along which to walk always in justice, so as to reach Me safely! Of course, I can understand My children’s weaknesses! Because of this, I asked My Son to give them the means to get up again after they have fallen. These means will help them to purify themselves from their sins, so that they may still be the children of My love. They are, chiefly, the seven Sacraments. And the greatest means of securing your salvation, despite your falls, is the Cross, My Son’s Blood poured out upon you every moment, if you so wish, both in the Sacrament of Penance and in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

So what is being given is not a blank check. It is a promissory note. A promise to pay from the Father – but the promise entails conditions to be met by us, the recipients. By turning to the Father, we open the gateway to salvation. But we have to walk through the gateway which means keeping the commandments, repenting from sin, becoming brothers and sisters of Jesus in the Holy Spirit. Yet the Promise assures us that we are not alone as we make our journey through the gateway into the Valley of the Shadow and from there to the eternal House of the Lord. Throughout the journey, the rod and the staff of the Father protects all those who call on him.

Promises to Keep

With respect to the audacity of the offer made, the Great Promise of the Father is similar to

 the promises relevant to salvation made at other divine interventions, in particular Fatima, the Sacred Heart, the Divine Mercy: 

Sacred Heart

“I promise you in the excessive mercy of My Heart that My all-powerful love will grant all to those who communicate on the First Friday in nine consecutive months the grace of final penitence; they shall not die in My disgrace nor without receiving their sacraments; My Divine Heart shall be their safe refuge in this last moment.”

Fatima

“I promise to assist at the hour of death, with the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months go to confession and receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary and keep me company for a quarter of an hour while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me.”

Divine Mercy

“The soul that will go to Confession and receive Holy Communion shall obtain complete forgiveness of sins and punishment. On that day all the divine floodgates through which graces flow are opened. Let no soul fear to draw near to Me, even though its sins be as scarlet.”

“I promise that the soul that venerates this image [of the Divine Mercy] will not perish.”

Just as the recipients of the Sacred Heart and Divine Mercy revelations were asked to commission icons associated with these revelations, the Father asked for an icon representing him. And just as there were requests for special feast days of the Sacred Heart and the Divine Mercy, the Father asked for a Feast day celebrating his love for his children. Both icons and feast days serve in making concrete and immediate what otherwise would remain abstract and forgotten.

Each promise made in these great interventions from Heaven – the Sacred Heart, Fatima, the Divine Mercy, Mother Eugenia – has to be taken in the context of the messages associated with that intervention as a whole and not in isolation. They are meant to move our souls to union with God but have no place for presumption or sloth.

“Have You Been Saved?”

Is “salvation” a one-time event? Some Protestants ask, “Have you been saved?” Their assumption is that a one-time profession of faith in Jesus as personal Lord and Savior is all that is required for salvation. For some Catholics, the Five First Saturdays or the Nine First Fridays or the Great Promise of the Father may seem to function as a similar one-time event that leads to salvation. 

But in these latter cases cited by Catholics what we have are promises from Heaven. These promises are not a substitute for our own perseverance in faith. Rather, they are promises that we will receive the grace to persevere to the end.  It is an ongoing one-time event!

As St. Paul writes, “Work out your salvation with fear and trembling. For God is the one who, for his good purpose, works in you both to desire and to work.” (Philippians 2:12-13)

The Protestant assumption that salvation comes from a one-time profession of faith highlights the importance of making a fundamental decision acknowledging our sins and finding liberation from sin and the wages of sin by accepting Jesus as Lord. Scripture tells us:

“You have had yourselves washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.” (I Corinthians 6:11)

“But God, who is rich in mercy, because of the great love he had for us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, brought us to life with Christ (by grace you have been saved) … For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not from you; it is the gift of God; it is not from works, so no one may boast.” (Ephesians 2:4-5, 8-9)

But Scripture also tells us: “It is the hour now for you to awake from sleep. For our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed.” (Romans 13:11) “For through the Spirit, by faith, we await the hope of righteousness.” (Galatians 5:5) Here salvation is spoken of as a future event.

Sadly, Scripture also tells us that Christians can fall away from the path of salvation: “There were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will introduce destructive heresies and even deny the Master who ransomed them, bringing swift destruction on themselves.” (2 Peter 2:1) “If we sin deliberately after receiving knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains sacrifice for sins but a fearful prospect of judgment and a flaming fire that is going to consume the adversaries. (Hebrews 10:26-27)

The point of the Promise is that the Father, who the Bible proclaims as the Author of salvation (“God so loved the world ”), will assist on the path to eternal life all those who “know” him and “cry, “Abba, Father!””  

One commentator offers further clarity on how the Father’s Promise relates to this perseverance to the end:

The sentence in question is this. “All those who call me by the name of Father, even if only once, will not perish, but will be sure of their eternal life among the chosen ones.”

However, elsewhere in the work, the other conditions for the salvation offered are mentioned.  The first is love: “Is it possible that, having called Me your Father and having shown your love for Me, you could find in Me such a hard and insensitive heart as to let you perish?   The second condition is repentance:   “I will forgive you after you have repented.”

Then elsewhere The Father unveils the mechanism by which this promise is fulfilled:

“If you love Me and call Me by the sweet name of Father, you will begin to live, here and now, in the love, and the trust which will make you happy in eternity and which you will sing in heaven in the company of the elect.  Is this not a foretaste of the happiness of heaven, which will last forever?”

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An insight into how the promise would be fulfilled in a person who subsequently falls away from God  is given in The Message where Our God tells in great details of an example of a long-offending soul who is facing sudden death but is not in a state of grace.  Before breathing his last the soul confesses his sins, seeks forgiveness and acknowledging God as his Father and Savior.  After calling God his Father, the man is judged with a paternal love and he is saved even though he had to spend a period of time in Purgatory.  This example shows The Message to be in complete compliance with Church dogma.  …

It is a beautiful thing to see and recount and explore the beautiful promises of salvation offered both here in the message to Sr Eugenia and in other instances in the history of the Church, as all of these promises testify to the great love of God for souls, his yearning to save souls, and the infinite power of His grace.    

To summarise, the phrase in the context of the whole message is to be understood in this manner:

If anyone is repentant and full of confidence in the love of the Father to us His Children,  they should surrender themselves to the Father and lovingly and trustingly call upon Him, then the Father  will give them the grace either of conversion here and now, but especially  at the hour of death He  will remember that act of love and give them such an extraordinary infusion of grace such as is necessary for their eternal salvation. 

It is obvious from a consideration of the whole of the message that the manner in which one calls “Father” is of utmost importance.  If one said “Father”, but with indifference or even worse with disdain or contempt, or in mockery,  then it is quite clear that the promise would not be fulfilled in them. The person needs to call upon the Father from the depths of their soul with love and trust and confidence. 

The Father understands that a lack of confidence in one’s eternal destiny is a ploy of the devil to have people put their trust in worldly things and sinful things.  The Father wants to fill his children with such trust that they become willing to turn their backs on the false promises of worldly and sinful temptations. 

Jesus said, “We can judge a tree by its fruits.”  When one allows one’s heart to respond to this sentence, a wonderful transforming effect can be received in one’s soul.  It can install in the heart and soul an extraordinary trust in the Father’s love and goodness and intention for our redemption and eternal happiness.  Is not such hope the key to true conversion?  One may here the objection that this sentence could lead to presumption.  But no, not at all.  The Father complained to Sr Eugenia about so many souls throwing themselves into the abyss of hell because they have not understood or responded to His love.  When one reads the whole of the message given to Sr Eugenia it is clear that the Father is seeking our total transformation in His love, and moreover that coming to a profound understanding of the Father’s love is a key to conversion. 

This one sentence also tells us a great deal about the Father: God the Father’s love is so great for us, beyond anything we can imagine.   He is faithful beyond our comprehension.3

A Father Who Seeks the Salvation of All

Running through the Father’s revelation is his concern for the salvation of all human beings – not simply professed Christians:

“And you, who only know the religion in which you have grown up, and that religion is not the true one, open your eyes. Here is your Father, He Who created you and Who wants to save you. I come to you to bring you the truth and salvation.”

[He wants the message of his intimate Fatherly love to be propagated because] “Most of the unbelievers, the impious and various communities remain in their iniquity and unbelief because they think that I am asking the impossible of them, that they have to submit to My commands like slaves of a tyrannical lord, whose power and pride keep him distant from his subjects, to oblige them to show Him respect and devotion.”

[He seeks to provide] “a smooth path for the conversion of sinners, sincere and persevering conversion, and the return of the prodigal sons to their Father’s house.” [He includes those who are in schism and heresy and even] “the sacrilegious, and the various secret sects.”

[He wants the devotion] “to be extended among all nations as quickly as possible.”

[He laments the fact that] “Men believe Me to be a terrifying God Who is going to cast all mankind into hell.” Rather, “I wish all My creatures to be convinced that there is a Father Who watches over them and Who would like them to enjoy, on earth, a foretaste of eternal happiness.”

“Believe Me, you who are listening to Me as you read these words: if all men who are far from our Catholic Church heard people talking about this Father Who loves them, Who is their Creator and their God, about this Father Who desires to give them eternal life, then many of these men, even the most obstinate ones, would come to this Father of Whom you had spoken to them.”

You, My children, who are outside the Catholic Church, should realize that you are not excluded from My fatherly love. I am making this tender appeal to you because you too are My children. If you have lived up to now in the devil’s snares, acknowledge that he has cheated you. Come to Me, your Father, and I will receive you with joy and love!

These poignant passages mirror what we read in Scripture of the Father’s desire to save every one of us:

“This is good and pleasing to God our savior, who wills everyone to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth.” (1 Timothy 2:3-4)

“The Lord does not delay his promise, as some regard “delay,” but he is patient with you, not wishing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9)

It is clear throughout the messages that the Father is seeking not just Christians but, in particular, those who are members of all other religions or no religion. He is intent on drawing them all because he is their Creator who desires eternal union with them. This concern for all humanity was later affirmed by the Second Vatican Council with its outreach to all. 

The Path to Salvation in the Revelation of the Father

How do we sum up the path to salvation laid out in the Father’s revelation? In essence, it affirms all that is taught by the Catholic Church on salvation while bringing to the forefront what Jesus and the New Testament taught but what many have forgotten: salvation is Father-oriented.

Baptism, the sacraments, the Eucharist, obedience to the moral law are fundamental. The Father calls this the “clearly indicated path … to reach Me safely.” Also fundamental is the eternal life that comes from knowing the Father and Jesus whom he sent and crying out “Abba, Father” through the Spirit acting in us and making us adopted brothers and sisters of the Eternal Son. Hence the Father’s focus on calling “ME BY THE NAME OF FATHER.” Finally, as the Father underlines, love is “the guiding principle in it all.”   

So first there is the stress on the pathway that the Church has always taught with priority given to the Holy Eucharist:

  • I come among you in two ways: the Cross and the Eucharist! The Cross is My way of coming down among My children, since it is through it that I caused My Son to redeem you. And for you, the Cross is the way to ascend to My Son, and from My Son to Me. Without it you could never come to Me, because man, by sinning, brought on himself the punishment of separation from God. In the Eucharist I live among you as a Father with His family. I wished My Son to institute the Eucharist so as to make every tabernacle the vessel of My favors, My riches and My love, to give them to men, My children. It is always by these two means that I cause both My power and My infinite mercy to come down ceaselessly.
  • Because, having instructed My Son to institute the Holy Eucharist, I intended to come to you every time you receive the Sacred Host! Of course, nothing prevented Me from coming to you even before the Eucharist, as nothing is impossible to Me! But receiving this Sacrament is an action that is easy to understand and it shows how I come to you! When I am in you, I can more easily give you what I possess, provided that you ask Me for it. Through this Sacrament you are intimately united with Me. It is in this intimacy that the outpouring of My love makes My holiness spread into your souls. I fill you with My love, then you have only to ask Me for the virtues and perfection you need and you can be sure that in those moments when God is reposing in His creatures, nothing will be refused you.
  • I ask everyone to take part in the Holy Mass according to the liturgy; this pleases Me greatly!
  • As for you, souls in a state of sin, or who are ignorant of religious truth, I will not be able to enter you; however, I will be close to you, because I never stop calling you, inviting you to desire to receive the benefits I bring you, so that you may see the light and be healed of sin. Sometimes I look at you and feel compassion for your unhappy state. I sometimes look at you with love, to dispose you to yield to the charms of grace. I spend days, sometimes years, close to some souls to be able to ensure their eternal happiness. They do not know that I am there waiting for them, calling them every moment of the day. However, I never become weary and I still feel joy in remaining close to you, always hoping that you will return to your Father some day and that you will at least offer Me some act of love before you die.

Come to Me, come with confidence and love! I will forgive you after you have repented. Even if your sins were as repulsive as mud, your confidence and your love will make Me forget them, so you will not be judged! I am just, it is true, but love pays for everything!

I asked My Son to give them the means to get up again after they have fallen. These means will help them to purify themselves from their sins, so that they may still be the children of My love. These means will help them to purify themselves from their sins, so that they may still be the children of My love. They are, chiefly, the seven Sacraments. And the greatest means of securing your salvation, despite your falls, is the Cross, My Son’s Blood poured out upon you every moment, if you so wish, both in the Sacrament of Penance and in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

But what is dramatic about the revelation to Mother Eugenia is its return to the New Testament proclamation of the font of salvation: the Father.

  • I make you a promise which will have an eternal effect. It is this: call Me by the name of Father, with confidence and love, and you will receive everything from this Father, with love and mercy.
  • I come to make Myself similar to My creatures, to correct the idea you have of a terrifyingly just God, as I see men spending their whole lives without confiding in their only Father, Whose only wish is to make their earthly life easier and then give them a divine life, in heaven.
  • But you, who abide in the true law, or rather, who have promised to follow the law that I gave you to ensure your salvation, have let vice lead you into evil. You have strayed from the law by behaving badly. Do you think you are happy? No. You feel that your hearts are not at ease. Do you suppose that, looking for pleasure and other human joys, your hearts will finally be satisfied? No. Let Me tell you, you will never feel truly free nor truly happy until you recognize Me as your Father and submit to My yoke, to be true children of God, your Father. Why? Because I created you for a single purpose, to know Me, love Me and serve Me, as a simple and trusting child serves its father!

The Father’s revelation to Mother Eugenia is important at all times but it is of the greatest relevance today with the across-the-board confusion about salvation. In this revelation we have both the forgotten precepts of the New Testament and the consistent teaching of the Church on the path to salvation.

End Notes

1Jean Galot, Abba Father We Long to See Your Face (New York: Alba House, 1992), 65.

2Ibid., 66.

3https://www.lovethefather.com/theological-difficulties