My view of what is necessary has gradually changed. Many of the things I used to do because I thought I ought, I no longer feel guilty at omitting. Perhaps it would be truer to say I try not to feel guilty. I now feel free to look more carefully at, say, a way of prayer or a devotion and ask, ‘Does that really bring me closer to God now?’ I used to want to do something because someone else obviously found it a way towards God. Now I can’t afford to waste effort. ... For example, thirty, forty years ago I used to find much inspiration in that very Franciscan devotion “The Way of the Cross”. Now I would find it much more profitable to read the daily paper with compassion for the endless accounts of what people, other sons and daughters of God, are suffering at this moment. Well, that’s all right – any way of prayer is meant to be a help towards God. If it ceases to be that, I had better leave it to others.

 

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