What happens when I so fall in love with God? "Only in love can I find you, my God. In love the gates of my soul spring open, allowing me to breathe a new air of freedom and forget my own petty self. In love my whole being streams forth out of the rigid confines of narrowness and anxious self-assertion which makes me a prisoner of my own poverty and emptiness. In love all the powers of my soul flow out toward you, wanting never more to return, but to lose themselves completely in you, since by your love you are the inmost center of my heart, closer to me than I am to myself.  But when I love you, when I manage to break out of the narrow circle of self and leave behind the restless agony of unanswered questions, when my blinded eyes no longer look merely from afar and from the outside upon your unapproachable brightness, and much more when you yourself, O Incomprehensible One, have become through love the inmost center of my life, then I can bury myself entirely in you, O mysterious God, and with myself all my questions." (Karl Rahner)

When we surrender our sinful need to be in control, we do not surrender the use of our free will. We freely choose to exercise this gift in a way that is in harmony with who we are and in harmony with our ultimate destiny and fulfillment.

"(God), You first loved us so that we might love you--not because you needed our love, but because we could not be what you created us to be, except by loving you." (William of St. Thierry)

"If we really love we will imitate. In fact, we couldn't give in exchange a more exquisite fruit of our love than imitation." (St. Augustine) (To be continued)