Excerpted from "The Seven-Storey Mountain" by Thomas Merton"We refuse to hear the million different voices through which God speaks to us, and every refusal hardens us more and more against His grace-and yet He continues to speak to us: and we say He is without mercy!
'But the Lord dealeth patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance.'
Mother of God, how often in the last centuries have you not come down to us, speaking to us in our mountains and groves and hills, and telling us what was to come upon us, and we have not heard you. How long shall we continue to be deaf to your voice, and run our heads into the jaws of hell that abhors us?
Glorious Mother of God, shall I ever again distrust you, or your God, before Whose throne you are irresistible in your intercessions? Shall I ever turn my eyes from your hands and from your face and from your eyes? Shall I ever look anywhere else but in the face of your love, to find out true counsel, and to know my way, in all the days and all the moments of my life?
As you have dealt with me, Lady, deal also with all my millions of brothers who live in the same misery that I knew then: lead them in spite of themselves and guide them by your tremendous influence, O Holy Queen of souls and refuge of sinners, and bring them to your Christ the way you brought me.
Show us your Christ, Lady, after this our exile, but show Him to us also now, show Him to us here, while we are still wanderers."
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