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Legion HANDBOOK D10944_1 26/02/2014 15:53 Page 287

CHAPTER 39 CARDINAL POINTS OF THE LEGION APOSTOLATE 287
relation to the objective. This final challenging gesture is
what the Legion has been calling “Symbolic Action.” Recourse
to it will explode the impossibility which is of our own
imagining. And, on the other hand, it enters in the spirit of
faith into dramatic conflict with the genuine impossibility.
The sequel may be the collapse of the walls of that Jericho.
“And at the seventh time, when the priests had blown the
trumpets, Joshua said to the people, ‘Shout! For the Lord has given
you the city’ . . . As soon as the people heard the sound of the
trumpets, they raised a great shout, and the wall fell down flat; so the
people charged straight ahead into the city and captured it.” (Josh
6:16-20)

5. ACTIVE WORK MUST BE DONE
The Legion without its spirit would be like any other lifeless
body. That spirit of the Legion, so transforming of its
members, is not floating around in the air, waiting to be
breathed in. No! that vital spirit is the product of grace out of
effort. It depends on the work which is being done, and on
the way in which it is being done by the individual
legionaries. If there is no effort, the spirit flickers low and may
die.
Due to: (a) a reluctance to embark on work which is
considered difficult, or (b) to an inability to discern the work
which exists abundantly even in the smallest places, but most
of all to (c) a dread of adverse criticism; there may be a
tendency to avoid active work or to allot insignificant tasks to
the members. But all are warned that the Legion machinery is
designed to supervise substantial active work. There is no
justification for setting up the system at all unless such
work is being undertaken. An army which refuses to
engage in battle: what a misnomer! Similarly, members of
a praesidium, which is not engaged in some form of active
work, have no right to the name of legionaries of Mary. It
is reiterated that spiritual exercises do not satisfy the
legionary obligation to do active work.
The inactive praesidium is not only untrue to the Legion
purpose of showing a virile apostolate in action, but it does a