Source: https://www.bertha-dudde.org/en/proclamation/0425

0425 Shaping the youth.... Intervention by God....

May 20, 1938: Book 9

You will be faced with a task that requires great willpower to solve, and therefore it should be strengthened again and again through our teachings. Thus today the Saviour has given you a teaching that refers to the inner development of all political measures, which have the sole purpose of strengthening power but depriving the people of all their freedom. These are the measures that are used in order to fully get hold of the youth.

Just in these times, where the young person should reflect on his inner life.... where he should begin to look at nature in a Divine sense.... where he should learn to look at all the wonderful things in the world with spiritual eyes.... It is precisely during this time that he is called upon to perform mechanical exercises that suffocate or atrophy all spirituality in him.... A world-view is forced upon them, the whole purpose of which is to eliminate everything of the future from their thought-life, that could have a positive effect on the refinement of the soul....

They start with the idea of forming a completely new line of thought.... this results in a degeneration of all spiritual thinking.... The train of thought of the youth will only move in those areas that are much more in accordance with the trivial demands on the youth.... but they can never bring the maturity of the soul. Because the youth knows nothing of a soul and it's destiny, or sees such an enlightenment only as a fable, to which a person of the present time do not need to pay any attention, the task which is placed today on the youth, misses the spiritual sense completely....

Everything that is striven for is only development for the earthly life, but not in the least a promoting influence on the spiritual constitution of the young person. The still existing reasoning is remodeled without consideration.... the responsible youth leaders consider their work full of satisfaction, consisting of a completely earthly shaping of the youthful soul, but blocks the way to the free search for the truth and deprives it of every opportunity to find or strive for food beneficial to the spirit. How are these earthly children to be guided.... how is the work to be accomplished in them, which opens another direction of thought for them....

Depending on the length of time, these people take root in a soil that is not very suitable for developing of the right spirit. On the contrary, they will use everything to expose any teaching that bears witness to God and to the descent of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, to earth for the purpose of the redemption of mankind. They will strive to present this His teaching - which should be the most holy for all - to be completely invented, and this is the worst time for the youth, which should be opposed with all power and will. And the Lord will therefore also with this, pull up the lever....

He will also bring judgment against those who are up to such a deforming of the youth.... Where should God's love reveal itself more vividly than with those who are entrusted to Divine love and whom the enemy is now trying to wrest.... The Lord does not let go of them so easily.... He will protect the young mind.... He will also put the question into their hearts: What is the purpose of the whole earthly existence in the nature of man?.... And with the help of the Lord, this question will not be lightly dismissed. But this question will be answered in their minds, and the systematic extermination of all spiritual experience will suffer a strong blow through the will of the Lord.

And then.... take note, you unbelievers, how ever more strongly the impulse will become apparent in the youth to recognize a higher Being.... take notice that an ever stronger resistance will make itself felt and finally demands freedom for all inner life.... Because God does not forsake those who remember Him, and will especially take care of the youth, so that they do not suffer harm to their souls. Therefore wait for the time which is no longer far away and will free you from the gagging of the spirit.... Because all this happens in the will of the Lord, who will gather His children around Himself, to give them knowledge of their actual purpose, so that they may pursue it and escape the banishment of the world through it.

Amen

Translated by Alida Pretorius