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JMJ
"There has to be another source of power outside our will. We do not nourish ourselves; we are dependent upon the plant and animal world outside. . . our spirits, too, are continuous with a larger spiritual world. We are not cisterns, but wells; we grow less by our own power than by assimilating with outside forces. . . As we establish contact with the atmosphere, which cannot be seen or tasted by breathing, so we establish commerce with the Divine Source of Power by prayer and the sevenfold channels which the Good Lord Himself offers to our depleted human forces."
(Life is Worth Living, Venerable Fulton Sheen)
St. Katherine Drexel was well known for her generosity, freely choosing to share her immense inheritance in order to build the Church through her missionary activities in America. But behind her zeal for the Gospel, was a great love of prayer, especially Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, a devotion she practiced continuously for the last twenty years of her life. In this she was profoundly influenced by the example of her father. Upon returning home from work each day, Francis Drexel, a wealthy Philadelphia banker, would retreat to his study where he would spend time in prayer until his soul was sufficiently refreshed, and then he would rejoin his family, eager to share in their joys.
Just as our bodies require nourishment so too our souls demand the spiritual nourishment that flows from prayer and the Sacraments. Unfortunately, one can confuse the two needs, and satisfy the senses when really it is the soul that is longing for comfort. And so one turns to food or to a screen or perhaps he indulges his emotions in gossip or an angry outburst; anything to momentarily provide relief to the unsettled spirit. It is the quick and easy remedy that attracts, but sadly, the consequences that follow only dull and deafen the soul to the quiet entreaties of Our dear Lord:
"Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest." (Mt 11:28)How He desires us! He wants us to spend time with Him, in prayer, in Adoration, in receiving Him in the Holy Eucharist. Can one be surprised if he has a difficult time maintaining his peace when he fails to communicate with the Prince of Peace? Katherine Drexel had recourse to vast material wealth, but she recognized her greater asset was her recourse to the infinite wealth that poured out from the "Divine Source of Power by prayer and the sevenfold channels which the Good Lord Himself offers. . ."
"Unite a dedicated will with this Divine Energy and a character is transformed into inner peace and outer service. 'I can do all things in Him Who strengthens me.' " (Ven. Fulton Sheen)
