Our vocation is not to go and reap in the Father’s fields; Jesus does not say to us: “Cast down your eyes and reap the harvest”; our mission is still more sublime. Here are the words of the Divine Master: “Lift up your eyes and see ...” see that in Heaven there are empty places; yours it is to fill them ... you are as Moses praying on the mountain; ask of Me labourers and I will send them, I await but a prayer, a sigh from out your heart!
Is not the apostolate of prayer higher as one might say, than that of preaching? It is for us to form labourers who by preaching the Gospel, will save thousands of souls of whom we thus become the mothers; what then have we to envy the Priests of the Lord?
XII LETTER TO HER SISTER CÉLINE
How beautiful is our vocation! It is for us, it is for Carmel to preserve “the salt of the earth.”[87] We offer our prayers and sacrifices for the apostles of the Lord; we ought ourselves to be their apostles while by word and example they preach the Gospel to our brethren.
HIST. D’UNE AME, CH. VI
A novice was grieving about her numerous distractions during prayer: “I too, have many,” replied Sœur Thérèse de l’Enfant Jésus, “but I accept all for love of the good God, even the most extravagant thoughts that come into my head.”
COUNSELS AND REMINISCENCES
Her prayer was continual though she was habitually plunged in aridity. One day a novice entering her cell, paused, struck by the celestial expression of her countenance. She was sewing with alacrity yet seemed lost in profound contemplation.
“Of what are you thinking?” asked the young Sister. “I am meditating on the Pater,” she replied. “It is so sweet to call the good God our Father.” And tears shone in her eyes.
HIST. D’UNE AME, CH. XII