To the same Sister. On seeing God in our trials.

I am surprised, my dear Sister, that with the help of the rules I have so often given you, you are not even yet able to recognise the hand of God in the misunderstandings that arise among people with the best intentions. "God," you say, "does not inspire anything that brings trouble." That, in one sense, is true, but is it not also true that God has permitted, and often permits His servants to be given to mistakes and illusions which are intended to try them, to exercise them, and, in this way to sanctify them by the trouble they cause each other? We see hundreds of examples of this in the lives of the saints, and again quite recently in the lives of St. Francis Regis, and the venerable Sister Marguérite-Marie Alacoque. [3] Try to judge, not by human judgment, weak, narrow, and blind as it is, but by divine judgment which alone is upright, sure, and infallible. In this way you will improve, and not have the peace of your mind and heart disturbed.

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Footnotes:

[3] N.B. Canonised in 1921.