The Importance of Going on Retreat by St. Peter Julian
Eymard
"The retreat offers three principal means of interior
renovation:
First, it purifies the soul of sin, especially of the
habit of sin, and attachment to sin.
On the road of life in which the Christian walks, the
wind raises up a sordid dust which falls back upon him,
sticks to him, even without his knowing it, and sullies
him… By studying ourselves in the light of the retreat,
we shall find certain habits of laziness, of negligence,
of self-love, of outbursts of temper, of excesses of the
tongue which are so well implanted in us that we fall
into them continually, easily, at the least occasion, as
if they were second nature to us… We ignore the cause of
them, neither have we ever gone to the root of the evil;
how then could we hope to get rid of them? The retreat
brings us a stronger light. It will discover us to
ourselves.
The second grace of the retreat is a renewal in us of
fervour.
It is a true axiom of the spiritual life that the soul,
of herself, goes on continually falling off in piety,
like the fire which consumes itself and tends always to
die out, even while burning its brightest. And on a
battlefield, when death does not claim us, even victory
tires us, and depletes our strength. For that reason,
the victor gives his troops time to rest in order to
retrieve lost energy. The exercise and the struggles of
the spiritual life wear out the strength of the soul. We
must give her some rest, so that she may be
reinvigorated. That is especially necessary in a life of
action, in which the soul spends much more of herself in
spreading the love of God around her… We are reservoirs,
and not very deep at that… If we want to give to others,
we must be supplied from elsewhere (outside ourselves),
at the risk of soon running dry… Start by being holy
yourselves and then you may sanctify others; glorify God
in you first and then you may glorify Him in others.
Lastly, the retreat prepares you a grace greater than
all the aforementioned: The enjoyment of God to an
exceptional degree.
In these days of solitude God communicates Himself to
the soul with goodness, meekness and tenderness. You
must enjoy God in your retreat in order to come out of
it fortified and ready to return cheerfully to your
daily duties. God in His tenderness must spoil you like
a mother her child. Alas! Sad to say, we are such
wretches that we are afraid of the goodness of God,
afraid of enjoying it too much, afraid to let ourselves
be plunged into it and submerged… We are all afraid to
lose our independence because we could then no longer
give a little of ourselves to the world or to self-love.
The reason is that if He ever comes into us for good and
invades us with the power of His goodness, if once he
makes His presence really felt, if once He makes us
break into tears of love and gratitude, we are done for,
we are no longer free, we are caught in the trap His
love has laid for us and we cannot break away from it;
we must surrender ourselves unconditionally."
In the Light of the Monstrance, pp. 212-219.
