In this world we have to live by faith, for all that we suffer comes from God’s hand. It is either willed or permitted by God—and for our good. Some trials indeed come straight from Him. Such are the interior anguish of dereliction, of desolation, of dryness, and others of the same kind. Our Lady suffered such a trial in the loss of her Son after the Feast. Think of this grief by the light of the love she bore Him. Think too, of the answer given her at the moment of her ecstasy at meeting Him again ; of another trial of hers when at the marriage in Cana He seemed to repel her suggestion. Did either shake her faith or cause her to protest ? Consider her gentleness whom His reproof rendered still meeker, and compare it with the impulse of our souls when God sends us trials. Where is our faith? We fail to find recollectedness in prayer, and we leave it off : we lose our old fervor in the reception of the Sacraments, and we
neglect them. In our spiritual desolation we turn to creatures for comfort and when God withdraws himself from us to prove our affection or to draw us to Him, we perhaps forsake Him.
O hard and foolish hearts ! Ask rather for crosses and trials and labor : they lead, as they well may, to a closer likeness to Mary’s holy heart, to a closer union with that of her Divine Son.
- P. Manfredini
Jesus, sick of heart. His friends asleep, and His enemies vigilant, places Himself entirely in His Father’s hands.
- Pascal
neglect them. In our spiritual desolation we turn to creatures for comfort and when God withdraws himself from us to prove our affection or to draw us to Him, we perhaps forsake Him.
O hard and foolish hearts ! Ask rather for crosses and trials and labor : they lead, as they well may, to a closer likeness to Mary’s holy heart, to a closer union with that of her Divine Son.
- P. Manfredini
Jesus, sick of heart. His friends asleep, and His enemies vigilant, places Himself entirely in His Father’s hands.
- Pascal
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