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Fr. Jean Nicolas Grou (1731–1803) lived through times of tremendous turmoil, first as a Jesuit novice when Jesuits were surpressed, and later during the French Revolution. In his book, The Spiritual Life, are the fruits of his sufferings and prayers.
Learning to Profit from your Faults
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Deriving profit from our faults is one of the most important topics in the spiritual life. It is quite certain that, in the designs of God, the faults into which He permits us to fall ought to serve for our sanctification, and that it depends on us to draw this advantage from them.
Nevertheless, it happens, on the contrary, that our faults themselves do us less harm than does the bad use we make of them.
What I have to say on this subject has nothing to do with those cowardly souls who use reserve with God and who wish to belong to Him only up to a certain point. They commit deliberately and knowingly a thousand faults, from which it is impossible to draw any profit, on account of the bad dispositions in which they are. The persons for whom I write are those who have made up their minds never deliberately and with intention to commit a single fault, and who nevertheless do fall into many faults, in spite of their good resolutions, through inadvertence, or on the impulse of the moment, or through weakness.
Do not be surprised or discouraged by your falls
To these persons it generally happens that they are astonished at their faults, that they are troubled by them, that they are ashamed of them, and so are angry with themselves and fall into discouragement. These are just so many effects of self-love, effects far more pernicious than the faults themselves. We are astonished that we should have fallen; but we are quite wrong, and it is a sign that we know nothing whatever about ourselves. We ought, on the contrary, to be surprised that we do not fall much more often and into much more grievous faults, and we ought to give thanks to God for all the falls from which He preserves us. We are troubled every time we discover some fault in ourselves. We lose our interior peace; we are quite agitated, and we occupy ourselves about this fault for hours, or even for whole days.
Now, we ought never to be troubled; but when we see ourselves on the ground, we must raise ourselves up again quietly. At once we must turn to God with love and humility and ask His pardon; and then we must never think about the fault again, until the time comes to accuse ourselves of it in Confession. And even if in Confession we forget it, there is no occa*sion to be uneasy on that account.
Or again, we are so ashamed of our faults that we hardly dare to tell them to our confessor. “What will he think of me, after so many promises, after so many good resolutions I have made in his presence?” If you declare your faults to him simply and humbly, he will only think the better of you; if you tell them to him with difficulty and reserve, he cannot help taxing you with pride in his own mind. His confidence in you will di*minish as he sees that you are not sufficiently open with him.
But the worst of all is this: we are vexed with ourselves; we are angry, as St. Francis de Sales says, at having been angry; we are impatient at having been impatient. What misery! Ought we not to see that this is pride pure and simple; that we are humiliated at finding ourselves, when put to the proof, less strong and less holy than we thought we were; and that we aspire to be exempt from faults and imperfections only so that we may take credit for it and so that we may be able to congratulate ourselves on having passed a day or a week without hav*ing anything to reproach ourselves with?
Finally, we grow discouraged. We give up all our practices of piety, one after the other. We give up prayer; we regard perfection as impossible, and we despair of ever attaining it. What is the use, we ask, of restraining ourselves, of watching continually over ourselves, of giving ourselves up to recollection and mortification, when we grow no better, when we cor*rect nothing and are always falling afresh?
Now, this is one of the most subtle snares of the Devil. And do you wish to be preserved from it? Then you must never be discouraged, no matter into how many faults you fall; but you must say to yourself, “If I should fall twenty times, a hundred times, a day, I will get up again every time, and I will go on my way.” What will it matter, after all, how many times you have fallen on the way if you reach your journey’s end safely at last? God will not reproach you.
Often our very falls come from the rapidity of our course and because the ardor that impels us scarcely gives us time to take certain precautions.
Those timid and overly cautious souls who always wish to see where they are putting their feet, who are always turning out of the way to avoid making a false step, and who are dreadfully afraid of contracting the least stain will not advance half so fast as the other, more generous souls, and death often overtakes them before their course is run. It is not those who commit the fewest faults who are the holiest, but those who have the most courage, the most generosity, and the most love, who make the greatest efforts, and who are not afraid of stumbling a little, or even of falling and staining themselves a little, provided they can always advance.
Our faults can lead us closer to God
Learning to Profit from your Faults
catholicexchange.com/profit-faults
http://1mpkoh2uj7ew36r28p3t8kxt11gl...ads/2014/01/shutterstock_99941969-660x350.jpg
Deriving profit from our faults is one of the most important topics in the spiritual life. It is quite certain that, in the designs of God, the faults into which He permits us to fall ought to serve for our sanctification, and that it depends on us to draw this advantage from them.
Nevertheless, it happens, on the contrary, that our faults themselves do us less harm than does the bad use we make of them.
What I have to say on this subject has nothing to do with those cowardly souls who use reserve with God and who wish to belong to Him only up to a certain point. They commit deliberately and knowingly a thousand faults, from which it is impossible to draw any profit, on account of the bad dispositions in which they are. The persons for whom I write are those who have made up their minds never deliberately and with intention to commit a single fault, and who nevertheless do fall into many faults, in spite of their good resolutions, through inadvertence, or on the impulse of the moment, or through weakness.
Do not be surprised or discouraged by your falls
To these persons it generally happens that they are astonished at their faults, that they are troubled by them, that they are ashamed of them, and so are angry with themselves and fall into discouragement. These are just so many effects of self-love, effects far more pernicious than the faults themselves. We are astonished that we should have fallen; but we are quite wrong, and it is a sign that we know nothing whatever about ourselves. We ought, on the contrary, to be surprised that we do not fall much more often and into much more grievous faults, and we ought to give thanks to God for all the falls from which He preserves us. We are troubled every time we discover some fault in ourselves. We lose our interior peace; we are quite agitated, and we occupy ourselves about this fault for hours, or even for whole days.
Now, we ought never to be troubled; but when we see ourselves on the ground, we must raise ourselves up again quietly. At once we must turn to God with love and humility and ask His pardon; and then we must never think about the fault again, until the time comes to accuse ourselves of it in Confession. And even if in Confession we forget it, there is no occa*sion to be uneasy on that account.
Or again, we are so ashamed of our faults that we hardly dare to tell them to our confessor. “What will he think of me, after so many promises, after so many good resolutions I have made in his presence?” If you declare your faults to him simply and humbly, he will only think the better of you; if you tell them to him with difficulty and reserve, he cannot help taxing you with pride in his own mind. His confidence in you will di*minish as he sees that you are not sufficiently open with him.
But the worst of all is this: we are vexed with ourselves; we are angry, as St. Francis de Sales says, at having been angry; we are impatient at having been impatient. What misery! Ought we not to see that this is pride pure and simple; that we are humiliated at finding ourselves, when put to the proof, less strong and less holy than we thought we were; and that we aspire to be exempt from faults and imperfections only so that we may take credit for it and so that we may be able to congratulate ourselves on having passed a day or a week without hav*ing anything to reproach ourselves with?
Finally, we grow discouraged. We give up all our practices of piety, one after the other. We give up prayer; we regard perfection as impossible, and we despair of ever attaining it. What is the use, we ask, of restraining ourselves, of watching continually over ourselves, of giving ourselves up to recollection and mortification, when we grow no better, when we cor*rect nothing and are always falling afresh?
Now, this is one of the most subtle snares of the Devil. And do you wish to be preserved from it? Then you must never be discouraged, no matter into how many faults you fall; but you must say to yourself, “If I should fall twenty times, a hundred times, a day, I will get up again every time, and I will go on my way.” What will it matter, after all, how many times you have fallen on the way if you reach your journey’s end safely at last? God will not reproach you.
Often our very falls come from the rapidity of our course and because the ardor that impels us scarcely gives us time to take certain precautions.
Those timid and overly cautious souls who always wish to see where they are putting their feet, who are always turning out of the way to avoid making a false step, and who are dreadfully afraid of contracting the least stain will not advance half so fast as the other, more generous souls, and death often overtakes them before their course is run. It is not those who commit the fewest faults who are the holiest, but those who have the most courage, the most generosity, and the most love, who make the greatest efforts, and who are not afraid of stumbling a little, or even of falling and staining themselves a little, provided they can always advance.
Our faults can lead us closer to God