"The only thing to be feared [in obedience to spiritual directors] is that superiors may sometimes follow human prudence excessively, and that for want of discernment they may condemn the lights and inspirations of the Holy Ghost, treating them as illusions and reveries, and prescribe for those to whom God communicates Himself by such favors as if they were invalids." -- Fr. Louis Lallement, S.J., La Doctrine Spirituelle

Yellowstone

"Whatever naturalism may say, in loving our neighbor in God and for God we do not love him less, we love him much more and far more perfectly. We do not love his defects; we put up with them; but we love in man all that is noble in him, all in him that is called to grow and to blossom in eternal life.

Far from being a Platonic and inefficacious love of our neighbor, charity, in growing, disposes us to judge him well and to condescend to his wishes in whatever is not contrary to the commandments of God. Condescension thus born of charity makes indifferent things good, and the painful things that we impose on ourselves for our neighbor, fruitful. There is great charity in thus preserving union with all by avoiding clashes which might arise, or by effecting a reconciliation as soon as possible. Charity that grows has thus a radiating goodness; it makes us continually love not only what is good for us, but what is good for our neighbor, even for our enemies, and what is good from the superior point of view of God, by desiring for others the goods which do not pass, and especially the sovereign Good and its inamissible possession. St. Thomas sums up all this briefly:

'Now the aspect under which our neighbor is to be loved, is God, since what we ought to love in our neighbor is that he may be in God. Hence it is clear that it is specifically the same act whereby we love God, and whereby we love our neighbor. Consequently the habit of charity extends not only to the love of God, but also to the love of our neighbor.'

Thus sight perceives light first of all and by it the seven colors of the rainbow. It could not perceive colors if it did not see light. Likewise we could not supernaturally love the children of God if we did not first supernaturally love God Himself, our common Father.

Whereas justice inclines us to wish good to another inasmuch as he is another or distinct from us, charity makes us love him as 'another self,' an alter ego, with a love of truly supernatural friendship, as the saints in heaven love one another."

-- Fr. Reginald Garrigou-LaGrange, O.P., The Three Ages of the Interior Life, vol. 2

Yosemite

I've finally escaped California. I'm at Yellowstone right now, last on my list of must-see for this trip; but that reminds me that I never got around to posting my pictures from Yosemite, which I managed to visit just as everything was beginning to shut down. So here they are.