If it be true that the rhythm of parish life should be accepted as the Church's normal means of bringing her members to their vocation of holiness, the danger of a false mystique must yet be faced and avoided. It is easy enough to envisage an idyllic order in which social circumstances and personal integrity alike encourage the growth of the Mystical Body as manifest in a local congregation of the faithful. But the facts are often painfully otherwise, and an appeal to a high achievement may trickle away into the lowest common denominator of what is customary.

The immediate difficulty springs from the fragmentation of parochial life, reflecting as it does the broken unity of social life everywhere. The crowded congregations at Mass may deceive; they must certainly be related to the crowds who have fallen away. And even the faithful, so often pitifully unaware of the deep resources of the faith they cling to, have largely ceased to be conscious of the God-given bond that brings them together. There can be no substitute for what is essential in any organism, and the Church is animated by the Holy Ghost himself.

In an old number of ‘Punch', in those days a very anti- Catholic paper, there was a picture of a small child about five: ‘Gran'ma', she says, ‘please I want to be a nun'. ‘Good gracious, child, whatever has put such a dreadful idea into your head?’ ‘Well, you see, Gran'ma, I've found the world is very hollow; even my doll is stuffed with sawdust— so please, I should like to be a nun.’

This early Victorian idea of a nun has unfortunately not yet died out. To many, even now, she appears as a disappointed, not too happy creature, who has somehow lost her way in the world. Many, even good Catholics who are ready to admire the active Orders who teach and nurse (God bless them!) regard the life of an enclosed contemplative religious as ‘pure waste of life', and do not hesitate to say so. This attitude, we hope, is the result of ignorance rather than of malice. They do not know anything about it, still less do they understand. They do not understand the distinction between a career and a vocation.

Here is a man, forty years old, with a mother whom he respects and venerates. In spite of his own absorbing occupations, he visits her every day for exactly half an hour. He talks as a son should about this and that, always going away at the same hour and returning the next day at the stroke of the clock. More cannot be demanded of him, and from a mother's point of view one could wish that all men did at least as much.

That is a picture of the beginning of the life of prayer—each day the Christian making his or her meditation, and following a method point by point—this is necessary at the beginning. It is already something, but that something is only a beginning, although there are those who think they are doing wonders with their fine thoughts and meditations.

Let us suppose then that the person remains faithful, and that God increases his grace. Oh, how young the soul becomes! It is no longer like a man of forty giving just half-an-hour each day to his mother.

Live according to thy calling’ is the advice given in the 2nd chapter of the Cloud of Unknowing, which is devoted to ‘a short stirring to meekness'. And in this the author sets the tone of the whole book, introducing in the firstplace this virtue of humility and leading thence to the full ‘noughting’ of oneself before God. For those accustomed to spiritual reading and spiritual exercises it is easy to spend time in considering what God is doing to the soul and so to begin to count his blessings and graces in prayer. This opens the door to a smugness and pride, which may well captivate anyone who is endeavouring to follow the instructions of The Cloud. So, he says, if the reader take the book seriously he must concentrate on the call, on that towards which he is progressing. If a man lives according to his calling he will begin to find the virtue of humility, for his eyes will never linger on himself except in seeing his tragic poverty, his wants and his needs: Look now forwards and let the backwards be.

The small local train from Lucerne winds its way up the wooded mountains to the famous medieval shrine of our Lady of Einsiedeln. There is no official pilgrimage going on at the moment, only a few peasants and hikers. The pilgrim from England looks out of the window at the grandiose lines of the mountains, with the Itigi in the distance, and wonders what he will find at this sanctuary of our Lady, once as renowned throughout Europe as Lourdes is today. Now the abbey comes into view; and at once the note is struck that will sound again and again during these thirty-six-hours; the note of contrast, of dissonance: the rich, overladen baroque building set within the wondrous simplicity of the Alpine scenery, a strange encounter between the pretentious architecture of self-centred Eenaissance man and the glory of the mountains made by the Lord.

At 4.15 next morning the pilgrim is woken up by a tremendous noise—the bells of Einsiedeln, as powerful as the surrounding mountains, calling all the neighbourhood to Mass.

There are three places in Lima intimately associated with St Rose: St Dominic's Church, where she is buried and where she habitually prayed during her lifetime; St Catherine's Convent, built on the site of the house where she died, where are. preserved many relics of her life; and the Church of St Rose, the first ever to be dedicated to her, built beside the site of her parents’ home and garden, which are still preserved. This church and adjoining garden and buildings contain all the most important places and objects associated with her.

The convent is an enclosed one, and the chapel installed in the room where S't Rose died, in which are preserved all the mementoes connected with her, is not open to the public. It is important, however, because it was there that the Spanish Dominican scholar, Fr Luis Alonso Getino, discovered in 1923 the sheets on which the saint had recorded, in a most original form, the mystical graces which she had been granted; this record completely alters our ideas of her character and mentality. I believe they are still unknown to the English reader.

For silence will enable thee to subdue the uprisings of passion, for thou fightest from a height while they lie beneath thy feet. Therefore, possess silence, in the fear of God, and no weapons of the enemy shall harm thee. For silence joined to the fear of God is a fiery chariot which bears its possessor up to heaven. This doth urge upon thee the prophet Elias who, loving silence together with the fear of God, was taken up into heaven. silence, whereby the monk advances in perfection; ladder reaching to heaven; way of the kingdom of heaven. silence, mother of compunction, mirror of sins, in which man sees his transgressions. silence which hinderest not tears, mother of meekness, companion of humility. silence, spouse of humility and enlightenment of the mind. silence, searcher of thoughts and promoter of discernment. silence, mother of all good, support of temperance, and obstacle to gluttony.