1948
TO RHONA BODLE: On when to pray and how to pray, with or without pleasant feelings and emotions; on prayer as our gift to God of our will and on good feelings as a gift from God; and on training oneself to meditate.
3 JANUARY 1948
I very much doubt if I’m good enough at prayer myself to advise others. First thing in the morning and last thing at night are good times but I don’t find that they are the best times for one’s main prayer. I prefer sometime in the early evening, before one has got sleepy—but of course it depends on how your day is mapped out.
‘Grudging’ though a nuisance need not depress us too much. It is the act of will (perhaps strongest where there is some disinclination to contend against) that God values, rather than the state of our emotions—the act being what we give Him, the emotions what He gives us (usually, I think, indirectly through the state of our body, health et cetera, though there are direct kindlings from Him too. There are presents, to be given thanks for but never counted on).
Of course it is very difficult to keep God only before one for more than a few seconds. Our minds are in ruins before we bring them to Him and the rebuilding is gradual. It may help to practice concentration on other objects twice a week quite apart from one’s prayer: i.e., sit down looking at some physical object (say, a flower) and try for a few minutes to attend exclusively to it, quietly (never impatiently) rejecting the train of thought and imagination which keep starting up. All good wishes.
TO DON GIOVANNI CALABRIA, who had sent Lewis the Litany of Humility composed by Cardinal Merry del Val: On the danger of being too aware of global worries and of forgetting to help Christ in the people close at hand; on the dignity to which God raises human beings when they receive Holy Communion; and on Lewis’s besetting temptations against humility.
27 MARCH 1948
I was glad to receive your letter—so full (as is your wont) of Charity.
Everywhere things are troubling and uneasy—wars and rumours of war: perhaps not the final hour but certainly times most evil.
Nevertheless, the Apostle again and again bids us ‘Rejoice’.
Nature herself bids us do so, the very face of the earth being now renewed, after its own manner, at the start of Spring.
I believe that the men of this age (and among them you Father, and myself) think too much about the state of nations and the situation of the world. Does not the author of The Imitation warn us against involving ourselves too much with such things?
We are not kings, we are not senators. Let us beware lest, while we torture ourselves in vain about the state of Europe, we neglect either Verona or Oxford.
In the poor man who knocks at my door, in my ailing mother, in the young man who seeks my advice, the Lord Himself is present: therefore let us wash His feet.
I have always believed that Voltaire, infidel though he was, thought aright in that admonition of his to cultivate your own garden: likewise William Dunbar (the Scottish poet who flourished in the 15th century) when he said
Man, please thy Maker and be merry;
This whole world rate we at a penny!
Tomorrow we shall celebrate the glorious Resurrection of Christ. I shall be remembering you in the Holy Communion. Away with tears and fears and troubles! United in wedlock with the eternal Godhead Itself, our nature ascends into the Heaven of Heavens. So it would be impious to call ourselves ‘miserable’. On the contrary, Man is a creature whom the Angels—were they capable of envy—would envy. Let us lift up our hearts! ‘At some future time perhaps even these things it will be a joy to recall.’
For the Litany composed by Cardinal Merry many thanks. You did not know, did you, that all the temptations against which he pours forth these prayers I have long been exceeding conscious of? [From the longing to be thought well of, deliver me, Jesus,…from the fear of being rejected, deliver me, Jesus,…] Touché, you pink me!
Let us pray for each other always. Farewell.
TO RHONA BODLE: More advice along the lines just given, with a word of consolation about how God holds us fast; on remedies for the overfamiliarity of some parts of scripture; and on patience with the process of intellectual conversion.
22 JUNE 1948
Splendid! As long as you keep in your present way—holding fast to God, whether the Incarnation can be accepted or not—you can’t go wrong. Because, you see, it is not really you who are holding fast to Him but He to you: and He will bring you to wherever He wants.
I should try St. John’s Gospel and the non-Pauline epistles if the first three gospels are deadened with familiarity. But why worry? (I don’t mean ‘Why read and think?’: that’s obviously right.) You are wondering if the Incarnation is true. Well, if it’s not true God doesn’t want you to believe it. If you are worried by not (or not yet) believing it, then you must in your heart of hearts believe it to be true, for who could be so worried at not believing an error!
Your own argument, that you at any rate have come to know God only thro’ Christ is a very strong one: and I don’t mind betting you will come to the Christian belief in the end. But don’t read with a determination to do so. Take the books naturally as you would any other serious books. And get out of your head expressions like ‘theological problem’, ‘dogma’ et cetera. You are an adult student reading some very interesting ancient records, with God to guide you. Let them and Him work. And don’t get fussed and don’t demand quick returns. All is obviously going pretty well.