Lenten Meditation - March 8, 2006

He whose Kingdom is not of this world1 showed me that true wisdom consists in ‘desiring to be unknown and counted as nothing,’2 in ‘placing one’s joy in the contempt of self.’3 Ah! I desired that, like the Face of Jesus, ‘my face be truly hidden, that no one on earth would know me.’4 I thirsted after suffering and I longed to be forgotten.

- St. Thérèse of Lisieux, Story of a Soul, The First Years in Carmel

1 John 18:36
2 The Imitation of Christ, 1,2:3
3 Ibid., III, 49:7
4 Isaias 53:3