Thou must be willing, for the love of God, to suffer all things: labours and sorrows, temptations and vexations, anxieties, necessities, sicknesses, injuries, detractions, reprehensions, humiliations, confusions, corrections, and contempt.
These things help to obtain virtue, try a novice of Christ, and procure a heavenly crown. I will give an everlasting reward for this short labour, and glory without end for transitory confusion.
-Bk. III,ch. xxxv.
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God in His mercy has always preserved me from illusions. I found the religious life just what I expected it to be; no sacrifice took me by surprise, and, as you know, I met with more thorns than roses. My daily bread was spiritual dryness, and, moreover, Our Lord willed that I should be treated with the utmost severity by our Mother, although she did not realize it at the time.
Every time I met her I was scolded. I had once overlooked a spider's web in the cloister, and she said in front of the whole Community: It is easy to see that our cloisters are swept by a child of fifteen! Take away that spider's web, and be more careful in future.
On the rare occasions when she took me for an hour's spiritual direction, I was scolded nearly all the time. What grieved me most was not knowing how to correct my faults, my slowness, for instance, and lack of zeal in my work.
-The Story of a Soul (L'Histoire d'une Âme)
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For more information, see this post.
Adapted from Just For Today(©1943 Burns & Oates)
Nihil Obstat: Reginaldus Phillips, S.T.L.,Censor deputatus
Imprimatur: Edwardus Myers, Vic. Cap.
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