I guess I’ll be thankful when these cares have been taken out of my hands. I will thank God for having mixed me up for a number of years with, and for having blessed me with the knowledge and appreciations of, so many families involved in these difficult situations, and with the support of my dear brothers in the Society of Jesus, and my sisters throughout the Church, and with generous benefactors who have kept my hand open all these days, and who have encouraged me so that my heart in unafraid, and who have enabled me to stay as an image of Christ doing good amongst the people.
Then, in my dream of the Last Day, Our Lord will come back and reward us for having, by his grace, straightened the world out, and having the poor competent, and the rich thoughtful, and the well-protected kindly and generous and involved, and the educated enthralled with the kingdom of God, and the spiritual able to perceive him in such a way as to make him visible to us.
I’m very grateful to God for having put me here and for maintaining me here through the grace and love of Our Lord and Savior, jesus Christ, and for the health and spirit and strength of the Holy Spirit and the grace he works in the whole Church. I am ready at any time to surrender myself to the arms of my heavenly Father. And when God lets me into heaven, I think I’ll ask to go off in a corner somewhere for half an hour and sit down and cry because the strain is off, the work is done, and I haven’t been unfaithful or disloyal, all these needs that I have known are in the hands of Providence and I don’t have to worry any longer who’s at the door, whose breadbox is empty, whose baby is sick, whose house is shaken and discouraged, and whose children can’t read.
John Predmore, S.J., is a USA East Province Jesuit and was the pastor of Jordan's English language parish. He teaches art and directs BC High's adult spiritual formation programs. Formerly a retreat director in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Ignatian Spirituality is given through guided meditations, weekend-, 8-day, and 30-day Retreats based on The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. Ignatian Spirituality serves the contemporary world as people strive to develop a friendship with God.
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