You must have often wondered why the enemy [God] does not make more use of his power to be sensibly present to human souls in any degree he chooses and at any moment. But you now see that the irresistible and the indisputable are the two weapons which the very nature of his scheme forbids him to use. Merely to over-ride a human will (as his felt presence in any but the faintest and most mitigated degree would certainly do) would be for him useless. He cannot ravish. He can only woo. For his ignoble idea is to eat the cake and have it; the creatures are to be one with him, but yet themselves; merely to cancel them, or assimilate them, will not serve.... Sooner or later he withdraws, if not in fact, at least from their conscious experience, all supports and incentives. He leaves the creature to stand up on its own legs--to carry out from the will alone duties which have lost all relish.... He cannot "tempt" to virtue as we do to vice. He wants them to learn to walk and must therefore take away his hand.... Our cause is never more in danger than when a human, no longer desiring, but still intending, to do our enemy's will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.*
-Uncle Screwtape
C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters
*See also, Mother Teresa's Crisis of Faith in TIME
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Sunday, September 02, 2007
Who can tell?
Morning Prayer from | |||||
The Book of Common Prayer | |||||
Sunday, 2 September 2007 The Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity |
All
Almighty and most merciful Father,
we have erred, and strayed from thy ways like lost sheep.
We have followed too much the devices and desires
of our own hearts.
We have offended against thy holy laws.
We have left undone those things
which we ought to have done;
and we have done those things
which we ought not to have done;
and there is no health in us.
But thou, O Lord, have mercy upon us, miserable offenders.
Spare thou them, O God, which confess their faults.
Restore thou them that are penitent;
according to thy promises declared unto mankind
in Christ Jesu our Lord.
And grant, O most merciful Father, for his sake,
that we may hereafter live a godly, righteous, and sober life,
to the glory of thy holy name.
Amen.
First Reading: Jonah 3.5-9
Second Reading: Revelation 3.19-22
Saturday, September 01, 2007
Today's Morning Reading
From today's morning reading of the Book of Common Prayer:
from the OT reading, Habakkuk 3:2
O Lord, I have heard thy speech, and was afraid: O Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the years make known; in wrath remember mercy.
from Te Deum Laudamus
from the OT reading, Habakkuk 3:2
O Lord, I have heard thy speech, and was afraid: O Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the years make known; in wrath remember mercy.
from Te Deum Laudamus
O Lord, save thy people and bless thine heritage. | |||||
Govern them and lift them up for ever. | |||||
Day by day we magnify thee; | |||||
and we worship thy name, ever world without end. | |||||
Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us this day without sin. | |||||
O Lord, have mercy upon us, have mercy upon us. | |||||
O Lord, let thy mercy lighten upon us, as our trust is in thee. | |||||
O Lord, in thee have I trusted; let me never be confounded. |
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