St. John Climacus has quite a step on the Divine Ascent in his writing on "Stillness." This nothing Catholic hermit is remiss in stillness, for sure, but all the same, we press on. There is not a thing that we cannot learn, nothing we cannot change in ourselves, by the grace of His Real Presence. The Virgin Mary desires to help us; our guardian angels delight in our desire to climb the stairway to heaven!
This thought strikes a lovely chord today.
"Take hold of the walking stick of patience, and the dogs will soon stop their impudent harassment. Patience is a labor that does not crush the soul. It never wavers under interruptions, good or bad. The patient [hermit] is a faultless worker who has turned his faults into victories. Patience sets a boundary to the daily onslaught of suffering. It makes no excuses and ignores the self. The worker needs patience more than food, since the one brings him a crown while the other brings destruction. The patient man has died before his death, his cell being his tomb. Patience comes from hope and mourning, and indeed to lack those is to be a slave to despondency."
And this little end note a staccato key:
"Let the soul's eye be ever on the watch for conceit, since nothing else can produce such havoc."
[Yes, always if there is havoc, we never fail to discover some pride of one sort or another having stirred the previousy still waters.]
God bless His Real Presence in us! Little children, let us love one another!
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