This is the thirty-eighth in a series of previously unpublished reflections from the 1854 spiritual notebook of Paulist Founder, Servant of God Father Isaac T. Hecker. The reflection series is being made public in conjunction with Father Hecker’s cause for canonization.

Yielding to God: A Hecker Reflection

We are willing to give ourselves to God as long as God leaves our self-will untouched. How can the Spirit of Truth lead us into all truth (John 16:13), unless we yield and follow? God demands of us a heroic abandonment of ourselves to His good pleasure (Francis de Sales). The measure of our abandonment is the measure of our union with God. It is the delight of God’s tender and pastoral heart to care for His children, the work of His hands and the price of the blood of His only begotten Son. For Divine Providence is the union of the wisdom, goodness and power of God which act in concert to conduct us to the beatific vision for which we are destined. The more we trust in God the more God will trust Himself to us. All God asks of us is to leave Him to act in full freedom in our regard, and all that God wishes is to make us, like Himself, infinitely holy and happy.

In God I place all my hopes and desires. I ignore the past, present and future. I throw myself unreservedly into the arms of God, my Father, my All. Though God should reject me, I will not doubt His love. All life is in God and aside from God there is nothing. “I am my beloved and my beloved is mine” (Song of Songs 6:3). Let it cost what it may, we must be willing to give up our concern for the present and future to the infinitely wise conduct of Divine Providence. Let us throw all our care upon God and place our confidence in His direction. God has not changed his Providence towards us so why should we change our conduct toward God? No one who has hoped in the Lord has been confounded. God protects all who seek Him in truth. “Take all that comes upon you and endure in your sorrow, be patient in your humiliation. Wait on God with patience, join with God and endure.” (Eccl 2).

A Response from Father Paul Robichaud, CSP

The Our Father is a prayer we know by heart, but do we understand what it is that we are saying to God? When we say, “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven;” do we mean that God’s will takes precedence in our lives? Servant of God Isaac Hecker opens this week’s reflection with this very question. He notes that we are willing to give ourselves over into God’s hands as long as our will and God’s will do not conflict with each other. When our plans our hopes, our wants come into conflict with God, are we willing to yield? How often have we heard people say, “I prayed but God did not answer my prayer.” God did not answer or God said no? Perhaps we did not pray hard enough. Perhaps God was testing us and we gave up to easily. Or perhaps our will and God’s will have come into conflict.

For Father Hecker these moments of conflict are opportunities to grow closer to God. The degree to which we yield to God is the measure of our union with God, he writes. It is the delight of God’s heart to care for His children. God seeks to make us holy and happy. But to be holy we have to endure difficulty and happiness is ultimately found in abiding in God’s love not in our own desires. God will always give us what we need but not always what we want. To distinguish between our wants and our needs is to grow in the spiritual life.

Hecker’s 1854 Spiritual Notebook

Servant of God, Isaac Hecker wrote these spiritual notes as a young Redemptorist priest about 1854 and they have never been published. Hecker was 34 years old at the time and had been ordained a priest for five years. He loved his work as a Catholic evangelist. The Redemptorist mission band had expanded out of the New York state, and the missionaries’ national reputation continued to grow. Hecker had begun to focus his attention on Protestants who came out to the missions. To this purpose Hecker began to write in 1854 his invitation to Protestant America to consider the Catholic Church, “Questions of the Soul” which would make him a national figure in the American church.

Hecker collected and organized these notes that include writings and stories from Saint Alphonsus Liguori, the Jesuit spiritual writer Louis Lallemant and his disciple Jean Surin, the German mystic John Tauler, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Saint Theresa of Avila and Saint Jane de Chantal among others. These notes were a resource for his retreat work and spiritual direction. These short thematic reflections demonstrate Hecker’s growing proficiency in traditional Catholic spirituality some ten years after his conversion to the Catholic faith.

If you have asked Father Hecker to pray for you or another person who is ill and you believe something miraculous has happened, please phone Father Paul Robichaud, CSP, at 202-269-2519 and tell him your story.