Feast of Blessed Charles de Foucauld
01 December 2007


Charles' Prayer of Abandonment:

Father,
I abandon myself into your hands;
do with me what you will.
Whatever you may do, I thank you:
I am ready for all, I accept all.

Let only your will be done in me,
and in all your creatures -
I wish no more than this, O Lord.

Into your hands I commend my soul:
I offer it to you with all the love of my heart,
for I love you, Lord, and so need to give myself,
to surrender myself into your hands without reserve,
and with boundless confidence,
for you are my Father.

 

Charles de Foucauld shot and killed in Tamanrasset in 1916. Earlier in the day he wrote to his cousin Marie:

Our annihilation is the most powerful means we have to unite ourselves to Jesus and to save souls; that is what St. John of the Cross repeated in nearly every line. When one wishes to suffer and to love, one can. One does the most of what one tries the most to do. One feels that one suffers but one doesn’t always feel that one loves, and that is added suffering. But one knows that one wishes to love, and wishing to love is to love. One finds that one doesn’t love enough. That’s true. One will never love enough. But Almighty God who knows of what he has molded us and who loves us more than a mother loves her child has told us—and he does not lie—that he will not cast out those who come to him.

—Charles de Foucauld, Writings, selected with an introduction by Robert Ellsberg (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1999)

further information on the spirituality of
Charles de Foucauld is available from:

--------------------------------

Fr Joseph Deegan
Parish Priest
Slane
County Meath
Tel:  +353 41 9824249

 


Bishop
Parishes • ReligiousEducationPastoral GroupsFamily PrayerVocations
Youth
Pilgrimages HeritageNews & ViewsDiocesan Office LinksWebdesignIndex

© the Diocese of Meath, 2007