Life and Prayer

The characteristics of our impulses are surprise and violence. When I am careless, I am capable of any clumsiness. The more I pray, the more alive Jesus is in my conscience; and the more alive and alert I am, the more easily I will neutralize my impulses and the more love there will be in my reactions.

Thus, the impulses of irritability, envy, revenge, thirst for honor and pleasure... are overcome in Jesus and with Jesus. With this, love grows, and, since love is unitive because it is weight (pondus, according to Saint Augustine), the attraction or momentum toward Him grows, toward a new encounter.

In the encounter, His presence becomes denser again. In this way, there's less selfishness and more love left in me. I leap into life, and with Jesus, everything is easy and everything makes sense. Living is a privilege.

Each achievement is rewarded with great joy and satisfaction. The burden grows, dragging me back to the encounter, and from the encounter, back to life. And so on. This is the vital cycle in which life and prayer go hand in hand in harmonious and alternating growth.

Extracted from the book “Dios Adentro” by Father Ignacio Larrañaga