To our Venerable Brethren Patriarchs, Primates, Archbishops, Bishops and other local Ordinaries enjoying peace and communion with the Apostolic See, Venerable Brethren, Health and Apostolic Benediction.

Although we have on many occasions ordained special prayers to be offered up throughout the world, and have often ordered the Catholic cause to be commended to God with greater insistency, no one will be surprised that in these present times we have once more seen tit to bring the I duty of special prayer home to souls.

In times of difficulty and hardship, more especially when the Powers of darkness seem to be given free rein to dare all within their power for the disgrace of the Christian cause, the Church has always been wont to implore God's help with greater fervour and perseverance, knowing that he is her author and defender. She has at the same time had recourse to the intercession of the saints in heaven, above all to that of the august Virgin the Mother of God, the support of whose patronage is surely the most powerful help in difficulty. Sooner or later the fruit of such pious supplication and of confidence in the divine goodness becomes apparent.

Quite normal people sometimes experience strange communications from a realm beyond their ordinary comprehension. Perhaps once or twice in their lives they will have a very vivid dream or a waking vision in which they see Christ himself, or angels or saints. These experiences are often inexplicable at the time, but they bring with them a certain assurance of having a real meaning, particularly when they are so unusual and unexpected. Such would seem to have been the experience of Mother Julian in her Revelations. But it is always necessary to examine such experiences critically and no one should readily accept them as of heavenly origin without a diligent testing of their nature and origin. St John of the Cross's writings make all this quite clear.

Let us now scrutinise more closely the happenings on that celebrated eighth of May. Were these shewings historical facts of divine origin or merely the dreams of a sick woman? This raises the question of the natural basis of mystical experience.

Man's soul is so wonderfully elevated above the condition of the body that it might be said to approximate more closely to the God who made it than to the body to which it is attached, and it is true that in the soul, alone of all created things, can be traced certain traits and lineaments of God's perfections. It is spiritual like God, and like God it is incorruptible and everlasting. It is free, it is able to foresee and provide, it has its will of which it disposes. Does it not appear to enjoy the privileges of eternity, when it looks into the future, makes the past live again and disposes of the present?

But never does it seem more like to God than when, soaring above all that is created it loses itself in the vast abyss of his infinite perfections, and, realising that it cannot comprehend them, is content to remain lost in them forever with no desire to return.

The author of the Acts of the Apostles tells how one day Philip the deacon was travelling south on the road from Jerusalem to Gaza. He caught up with an Ethiopian eunuch driving along the same way in his chariot, and, as he did so, he overheard him reading aloud to himself the prophecies of Isaias. Philip asked him whether he understood what he was reading, and the Ethiopian replied: ‘How could I understand unless someone tells me what it is all about?’ He had got as far as: ‘He was led away like a sheep to be slaughtered, like a lamb that is dumb before its shearer, he would not open his mouth. He was brought low and all his rights taken away; who shall tell the story of his age? His life is being cut off from the earth.’ Said the eunuch: ‘Who is the prophet speaking of here? himself, or someone else?’ Philip answered by telling him all about Jesus.

The ‘Science of the Cross’ could never be an easy discipline, for each stage of learning brings us face to face with a demand which seems more impossible than the last. One of these lessons is repeated so insistently and frequently that we should become weary of it, did we not acknowledge in the depths of our heart that-we had never really learnt it; it is that which teaches us our uselessness. There are always a certain number of ardent souls who surrender themselves so fervently to the ‘Science of the Cross’ that their own uselessness is quickly made clear to them; they gladly give back their whole personality and their gifts to God, confident that he will use them in his good time and in his way; faced with the choice of ‘all or nothing’ they choose nothingness and receive all. Two such heroes of the spiritual life were Pere Jacques de Jésus, a French Carmelite, and Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, a Carmelite from Eegina Pacis Carmel in Cologne, stories of whose martyrdom, movingly told by members of their communities, have now been published

A few months ago we promised to provide some regular contributions for religious men and women. It has proved a surprisingly difficult task to discover writers willing to undertake this responsible work. However we are fortunate to have secured from the posthumous papers of the late Very Eeverend Father Austin Barker, O.P., S.T.M., a profound and thorough treatment of the foundation of religious life. In his essay on obedience the author, who was Professor of Metaphysics at the English Dominican House of Philosophy, takes the opportunity of showing the natural basis for the complete self-dedication of the vow of obedience, so that his words do in fact provide wholesome doctrine for all readers, be they lay or religious. But the final chapters which, as we are publishing the essay serially, will only appear in The Life of The Spirit after several months, are concerned more exclusively with the vow of obedience and its implications. We publish below Father Barker's introduction to his essay under the title which he gave to the whole work.

The subject matter of this essay, in so far as it is concerned with what is called the Obediential Potency, naturally finds no exact place within a course of philosophy properly so-called, when later the student proceeds into formal theology, the divine science, it is customarily assumed that the matter has been already sufficiently studied in the preliminaries to theology. It finds its right place within the Science of fundamental theology, or Apologetics, which deals with the Praeambula Fidei, the motives of credibility and similar material. Sometimes, however, its central importance fails to receive adequate attention, and its essential significance, while not being entirely overlooked, rarely obtains the emphasis which is its due. The following pages are intended briefly to co-relate it with the growth of divine action in the soul, and to suggest that the endowment of divine grace progressively proceeds in correspondence with the development of the obediential capacity.

Religious life is the genuine and wholehearted dedication of man to the love and service of God. In taking vows of religion there is implied a recognition and realisation of the infinitely great and good God, the fountain and source of all goodness, together with an appreciation of our Lord's love in dwelling among us and planning to have certain creatures associated with him for his own great ends and the vast needs of souls. Thus to dedicate our life to God in the following of Christ is not a decision man makes entirely of himself, no matter how much he may be enamoured with the ideal. ‘It was not you that chose me, it was I that chose you’ (Jn. 15, 16), our Lord told the apostles, thereby signifying that it is for God to choose whomsoever he will. Yet although the initial choice of invitation is from God, it is for us to accept, to acknowledge that call, that divine beckoning. When he has chosen us, we in turn must choose him and choose him alone, choose him to the exclusion of all else.