Abandonment; or, Absolute Surrender to Divine ProvidenceCaussade, Jean Pierre de
Religion
Abandonment; or, Absolute Surrender to Divine Providence
Caussade, Jean Pierre de
Mysticism -- Catholic Church; Spiritual life -- Catholic Church
They are shocked at the treatment Jesus received at the hands of
the Jews. Ah! Divine Love! Adorable Will! Infallible Action! How do
they look upon Thee? Can the divine will err? Can anything it sends
be amiss? But I have this to do; I need such a thing; I have been
deprived of the necessary means; that man thwarts me in such good
works; is not this most unreasonable?--this sickness overtakes me when
I absolutely need my health. No, dear souls, the will of God is all
that is absolutely necessary to you, therefore you do not need what
He withholds from you--you lack nothing. If you could read aright
these things which you call accidents, disappointments, misfortunes,
contradictions, which you find unreasonable, untimely, you would blush
with confusion; you would regard your murmurs as blasphemies: but you
do not reflect that all these things are simply the will of God. This
adorable will is blasphemed by His dear children who fail to recognize
it.
When Thou wert upon earth, O my Jesus! the Jews treated Thee as a
sorcerer, called Thee a Samaritan; and now that Thou livest in all
ages, how do we regard Thy adorable will forever worthy of praise and
blessing? Has there been a moment from the creation to this present
one in which we live, and will there be one to the last day, in which
the holy Name of God is not worthy of praise?--that Name which fills
all time, and all the events of time; that Name which renders all
things salutary!
What! Can that which is called the will of God work me harm? Shall I
fear, shall I fly from the will of God? Ah! where shall I go to find
something more profitable if I fear the divine action and resist the
effect of the divine will?
How faithfully we should listen to the words which are each moment
uttered in the depths of our hearts! If our senses, our reason, hear
not, penetrate not the truth and wisdom of these words, is it not
because of their incapacity to divine eternal truths? Should I be
surprised that a mystery disconcerts reason? God speaks; it is a
mystery; therefore it is death to the senses and reason, for it is
the nature of mysteries to immolate to themselves sense and reason.
Through faith mystery becomes the life of the heart, to all else it
is contradiction. The divine action killeth while it quickeneth; the
more we feel death the firmer our faith that it will give life; the
more obscure the mystery, the more light it contains. Hence it is that
the simple soul finds nothing more divine than that which is least so
externally. The life of faith wholly consists in this constant struggle
against the senses.
_CHAPTER VIII._
The Revelation of the Present Moment is the more Profitable that it is
addressed Directly to us.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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