The work is hard, I know, and the harder it is, the more stimulating it is.  You have understood that it will be fruitful in so far as it will not be your own but Christ’s and that means the Church’s.  And this will come about through obedience, the obedience of the spirit: seeing Christ in those who give us orders…this makes obedience natural since it means saying “yes” to Christ.

Avoid all tenseness in your relations with the Lord.  Let your action be contemplation.  This is possible if you see Christ in your work and in the people you meet, if you welcome Christ and help Him to grow.

May I confess that it is when my dispensary is in full swing that I can best contemplate?  “I was sick and you cared for me,” so in suffering flesh of these sick ones I have the overwhelming honor and joy of touching the flesh of Christ.  I call that an experience of “the real presence”.

And you, too, can welcome the Christ Child in these little ones entrusted to you.  Go to the Lord with great simplicity, lucidity, and self-control—no exaltation.  Which does not mean that if, at certain moments, Our Lord wants to “ravish” us, we haven’t the right to feel how wonderful this is.  –Father Albert Peyriguere ‘Voice From the Desert’

Father’s word possess subtle nuances, a saturation of applied wisdom, experience proving spiritually fruitful.  There is a presence within.  I marked in bold the words I took deepest to heart–no exaltation.  Internally, emotionally, a man of extremes, I trend to exaltation in worship and deed.  It is advice staunchly provided by another.  This morning I am bound for mass at Jennings, a wonderful place of Catholic faith being applied to caring and tendering for men and women in a similar manner as Father Peyriguere brought to the world, and his spiritual directee provided for children.

Hold on, plans have changed, Jennings mass begrudgingly put off to another morning.  I just received a telephone call from the Hospice, my presence is requested for a vigil, a sobering call to sit bedside with a man of ninety-one years experiencing final moments due to congestive heart failure.  Within lucidity, simplicity, and self-control, I feel blessed.  Matters are starting to go into full swing with the Hospice.

Jennings Chapel’s tabernacle, taken with my phone.

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