Patience
Thoughts on the Patient Endurance of Sorrows and Sufferings
ABANDONMENT OR ABSOLUTE SURRENDER TO DIVINE PROVIDENCE
"We know that to them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to His purpose, are called to be saints" (Rom. viii. 28). These words of St. Paul are an encouragement to all who suffer; they should incite every follower of Christ to the patient endurance of trials and tribulations.
In his preface to the highly commendable work of the Rev. J. P. De Caussade, S.J., on "Abandonment or Absolute Surrender to Divine Providence," Father Ramiere accentuates three principles which form the basis of the virtue of abandonment:
First Principle: Nothing is done, nothing happens, either in the material or in the moral world, which God has not foreseen from all eternity and which He has not willed or at least permitted.
Second Principle: God can will nothing, He can permit nothing, but in view of the end He proposed to Himself in creating the world, namely, in view of His glory and the glory of the Man-God, Jesus Christ, His only Son.
Third Principle: As long as man lives upon earth, God desires to be glorified through the happiness of this privileged creature, and consequently in God's designs the interest of man's sanctification and happiness is inseparable from dIe interest of the divine glory.
If we do not lose sight of these principles, which no Christian can question, we shall understand that our confidence in the providence of our Father in heaven cannot be too great, too absolute, too child-like... [Continued tomorrow]
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Compiled and Edited by Rev. F. X. Lasance
Author of "My Prayerbook," etc.
1937, Benziger Brothers
Printers to the Holy Apostolic See
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