The soul has within it a love which can never be satisfied till it has found God, but there are in its conscious life many desires of varying kinds, and according as it tends in covetousness to the less worthy of these it loses the knowledge of and taste for its own true good. Let it, however, be assimilated to the perfect good, put on the likeness of God’ then it becomes a pattern of the divine exemplar and one in heart and mind with the object of its love…. He now becomes the law and life, the word of command and the ultimate vision to be seen not with impoverished human eyes but as he is in himself.
The vision and final beatitude are delayed, that the recipient of such a favour may by free response cooperate with grace; and hence it is that faith is an acceptance, a belief in the Word of God and his promises…. The believer knows that his whole being is caught into a new order and that it is by the presence of the Spirit of wisdom and love that he can cry, Abba, Father! And so it is that the pilgrim of eternity who wanders with heart uneasy—finding many roads but not the road, hearing many voices but not the one beloved voice he would fain hear despite his unworthiness—at a moment chosen by God sees stretching before him a way which he is sure is the only Way to a home beyond all his dreams, and hears unmistakably from without and from within the voice of Truth summoning him to that Life eternal which is union with the Godhead.
Father Martin Cyril D’Arcy, SJ
Father D’Arcy (1976) was an English Jesuit priest, philosopher and advisor to many artists and literary figures.”