THE SPIRITUAL WRITINGS OF FATHER GROU, S.J.
BY BARON FRIEDRICH VON HUGEL. In a transition period such as our own, in an age of hurry, of noise, of restlessness and self-consciousness, in which even the most direct and earnest find it specially difficult to rise to something more positive and more persuasive than some more or less contentious anti-Protestantism ; in times […]
ON TRUE AND SOLID DEVOTION.
Rev. Jean Grou, S.J. THE word devotion, which is derived from the Latin, answers to that of devotedness, — a vowing of oneself, a consecration of one’s self. A devout person is, then, a person devoted to God, consecrated to God. There is no stronger expression than that of devotion to mark that disposition of […]
ON ENTIRE ABANDONMENT.
Fr. Jean Grou, S.J. “Father, into Thy hands I commend My Spirit.” OUR Lord and Savior Jesus Christ made this act of entire abandonment when He was forsaken by His Father, treated by Him as a Victim loaded with all the sins of the universe, and as if He were an object of malediction — […]
ON SOME WORDS OF THE PSALM VIII:
Fr. Jean Grou, S.J. “Ex ore infantium et lactentium perfecisti laudem.” “Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings Thou hast perfected praise.” JESUS CHRIST applied these words to Himself, and made use of them to confound the Pharisees, who were offended at the homage the people paid Him on His entry into Jerusalem, a […]
ON SIMPLICITY.
Fr. Jean Grou, S.J. IT is easier to feel what simplicity is than to define it. To understand what it is, let us contemplate it first as it is in God; afterwards we will consider it as it is displayed in an interior soul; and we shall come to the conclusion that in God, as […]
ON REFLECTIONS DURING PRAYER.
Fr. Jean Grou, S.J. THE wise King Solomon tells us that “there t’s a time for all things.” Now in prayer, as in everything else, there is a time to reflect, and a time to reflect no longer. Reflections are very useful, and even necessary, to make us understand the truths of religion, to enter […]
ON THE CRUCIFIX.
Fr. Jean Grou, S.J. ST. PAUL said that all religion was contained for him in the science of the crucifix — “Jesus Christ, and Him crucified; ” and most assuredly he was right. The crucifix is the abridgment of all that a Christian ought to believe, and all that he ought to practice. The crucifix […]
ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE HOLY EUCHARIST AND THE CROSS.
Fr. Jean Grou, S.J. OUR Lord Jesus Christ instituted the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist immediately before His Passion, to show us the connection that there is between this sacrament and the cross. When He instituted it He changed separately, and by two distinct actions, the bread into His Body and the wine into His […]
ON THE EFFECTS OF HOLY COMMUNION.
Fr. Jean Grou, S.J. “He that eats My flesh, and drinks My blood, dwells in Me, and I in him.” THE meaning of these words of our Lord Jesus Christ, this mutual dwelling of Him in us, and of us in Him, is something so grand and so Divine that it is impossible for us […]
ON THE INTERIOR OF JESUS CHRIST.
Fr. Jean Grou, S.J. “Let this mind be in you; which was also in Jesus Christ.” — St. Paul to the Philippians. BY the “interior” of Jesus Christ, we mean the secret dispositions of His soul, which were the principle and rule of His whole life. It is these interior dispositions which give a value […]