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Daily Readings
Daily Readings with Jean-Pierre de Caussade
- GenresCatholic
96 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 1986
20 people want to read
About the author
Jean-Pierre de Caussade
25 books64 followersJean Pierre de Caussade was a French Jesuit priest and writer known for his work Abandonment to Divine Providence (also translated as The Sacrament of the Present Moment) and his work with Nuns of the Visitation in Nancy, France.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
April 29, 2011
This is not your standard devotional book, in that Robert Llewelyn deliberately excerpts spiritual advice offered by Fr. de Caussade (1675-1751) from longer letters whose full context is only hinted at. Nevertheless, the enduring insight of de Caussade's spirituality is crystal clear: self-abandonment to divine providence is, paradoxically, the only way for anyone to find true liberty.
I was surprised at how well de Caussade's syntax holds up, both in translation and across the span of some 260 years. His phrasing is often rotund by postmodern standards, but it's never unclear, and like any good spiritual director, he pulls no punches with those in his charge, writing even of humility with boundless confidence. Like Solanus Casey centuries later (or Job, before them both), de Caussade's credo seems to have been "thank God for everything, no matter what happens."
What kept this book from a five-star rating (for me) is that the same confidence that made de Caussade a wonderful teacher and spiritual director can also make him insufferable, as when he chides a nun to whom he is writing for being too eager for the "interior life." Similarly, his advice, while quite obviously trustworthy from the vantage point of a spiritual dwarf like me, sometimes seems facile. In answering a question about what can be done to prevent attitudes that diminish interior peace, for example, de Caussade says simply "Never retain them wilfully; never parley with them, nor yet combat them with effort, nor violence, which would make them doubly hurtful. Drop them as one drops a stone into the water. Think of something else..." All well and good, says I, while suspecting that holy detachment of the kind he is writng about takes practice.
I was surprised at how well de Caussade's syntax holds up, both in translation and across the span of some 260 years. His phrasing is often rotund by postmodern standards, but it's never unclear, and like any good spiritual director, he pulls no punches with those in his charge, writing even of humility with boundless confidence. Like Solanus Casey centuries later (or Job, before them both), de Caussade's credo seems to have been "thank God for everything, no matter what happens."
What kept this book from a five-star rating (for me) is that the same confidence that made de Caussade a wonderful teacher and spiritual director can also make him insufferable, as when he chides a nun to whom he is writing for being too eager for the "interior life." Similarly, his advice, while quite obviously trustworthy from the vantage point of a spiritual dwarf like me, sometimes seems facile. In answering a question about what can be done to prevent attitudes that diminish interior peace, for example, de Caussade says simply "Never retain them wilfully; never parley with them, nor yet combat them with effort, nor violence, which would make them doubly hurtful. Drop them as one drops a stone into the water. Think of something else..." All well and good, says I, while suspecting that holy detachment of the kind he is writng about takes practice.
Displaying 1 of 1 review