by Fr. Francesco Cardarelli, cpps

Father, I can’t pray peacefully. There is nothing I can do, it is all a heart activity. I try to hide, but I can’t, it would disturb the stillness of my soul, which then wants to be as it pleases: it doesn’t even want the words that I have learned or read in books and so many times impatience takes over me, that impatience that takes away my peace. It is there that the soul cries because humanity would like to enter, it cries like a little girl when she sees a beast that wants to take away what she has in her hands and does not know how to get out of it, so she remains in silence abandoned in the hands of God and Most Holy Mary. She stays in this silence and then bursts into tears because of the turmoil of her affections and would cry out if she didn’t do it…since I began to pray, I can never hope to prepare myself: if I prepared for meditation, my soul would go somewhere else and do something different: that’s why it is like a child. There must be some strong deception in all this… Oh my God help me!

(Maria de Mattias, Letters n. 650, vol. III, p. 10)

My daughter, let the soul go where it is pulled towards. The rules indicated for preparation are for the time when there is no such pull. In time you will know whether the soul remains as in an enchantment, or whether it is present to itself, and what affections nourish it. So also, whether the soul goes to the virtues of God or even to other thoughts, such as the Institute, and how the soul remains after such prayer. I do not see the illusion you fear. Live calmly!

(Giovanni Merlini, Letters to Maria De Mattias n. 344, vol. II, p. 592-593)

Even the soul of a great saint has been restless and experienced difficulties in praying. Indeed, it can often and willingly happen that we prepare for prayer full of good will, armed with a little prayer book and rosary beads, hoping to offer God all our attention and energy, but at one point our mind wanders, thinks, gets distracted, the heart begins to get upset and we come out thinking that we have done something wrong… But prayer is not directly proportional to our merits! It is the most genuine expression of a relationship with Jesus that is manifested in the manner of a rapport. Giovanni Merlini invites Maria to let her soul go where it is pulled towards, not forcing her way into a relationship that needs to breath, to have space, and to feel freedom; however, at the same time he leads her to the relevant discernment work of the souls: to understand what it is that moves within her and what stirs her heart, whether it brings her closer to God or not. Being followed by a spiritual guide is very helpful in making truth and unmasking doubts that disturb our living and tasting life in Christ!

“Nel Segno del Sangue” (In the Sign of the Blood) November/December 2018