This is the forty-fifth in a series of previously unpublished reflections from the 1854 spiritual notebook of Paulist Founder, Servant of God Father Isaac T. Hecker. The reflection series is being made public in conjunction with Father Hecker’s cause for canonization.

Hecker Reflection: Spiritual Basics

It is the will of God that we should leave undone what we cannot do without trouble. There is a point in the spiritual life when God does most for us when we do the least for ourselves. There are two shoals against which we may make spiritual shipwreck: self-activity and idleness. Freedom of spirit will guide us safely between these. For without interior freedom there can be no fidelity to divine grace … for this liberty is of God. As Paul writes in Romans (8:15) “For you have not received a spirit that makes you a slave to fear, but you have received the spirit of sonship whereby we cry Abba, ‘Father.’”

All that the soul can ask, and what ought surely to be granted, is to follow faithfully the invitations of grace and the impulses of God’s Spirit. If the soul is guided by the Holy Spirit, it would not do the least thing contrary to faith or the church, for we are taught inwardly by the Holy Spirit and outwardly by the holy church in the same grace.

Response by Father Paul Robichaud, CSP

There are so many forms of Catholic spirituality that it can be hard to choose a particular form to practice. There are classic traditions of spirituality such as Benedictine, Franciscan, Carmelite, Redemptorist and Ignatian. There are new approaches from movements like Opus Dei, Focolare, San Egidio, Communione e Liberatione and the Neocatechumenate. In the richness of our Catholic faith, just where do we begin to develop a spirituality to guide your prayer and actions?

Servant of God Father Isaac Thomas Hecker goes back to basics. Christian spirituality begins with the individual soul’s encounter with God. Jesus has give us the extraordinary gift of calling God our Father who has given us in our creation, the further gift of interior freedom which allows us to respond to the invitations of God’s grace. Use these gifts, says Father Hecker, and if your general conduct is attuned to the spirit of God or if you work at a specific form of spirituality and it draws you closer to God, than be assured you are on the right path.

He goes on to say that two mistakes people make in the spiritual life is attempting to do too little or too much. The answer lies somewhere in between the two. Father Hecker reminds us that our spiritual lives are a living relationship with God; sometimes God calls us to act and sometimes God invites us to stop and be still. It is in our living with God that the dynamics of faith grow guided by the Holy Spirit.

This holy season of Lent provides an opportunity to deepen our spiritual lives in preparation for the celebration of the death and rising of Jesus in Holy Week. Perhaps we might take a lesson from Father Hecker and examine just how we doing in our response to God’s grace in our lives. Does our present practice draw us closer to God? Are we doing too much or too little? Lent is not over yet but Easter is not far off. Use these closing weeks of Lent to deepen your relationship to God.

Hecker’s 1854 Spiritual Notebook:

Servant of God, Isaac Hecker wrote these spiritual notes as a young Redemptorist priest about 1854 and they have never been published. Hecker was 34 years old at the time and had been ordained a priest for five years. He loved his work as a Catholic evangelist. The Redemptorist mission band had expanded out of the New York state, and the missionaries’ national reputation continued to grow. Hecker had begun to focus his attention on Protestants who came out to the missions. To this purpose Hecker began to write in 1854 his invitation to Protestant America to consider the Catholic Church, “Questions of the Soul” which would make him a national figure in the American church.

Hecker collected and organized these notes that include writings and stories from Saint Alphonsus Liguori, the Jesuit spiritual writer Louis Lallemant and his disciple Jean Surin, the German mystic John Tauler, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Saint Theresa of Avila and Saint Jane de Chantal among others. These notes were a resource for his retreat work and spiritual direction. These short thematic reflections demonstrate Hecker’s growing proficiency in traditional Catholic spirituality some ten years after his conversion to the Catholic faith.

Publishing and disseminating the writing of Servant of God Isaac Hecker is the work of the Office for Hecker’s Cause.

Paulist Father Paul Robichaud CSP is Historian of the Paulist Fathers and Postulator of the Cause of Father Hecker. His office is located at the Hecker Center in Washington D.C.

If you have asked Father Hecker to pray for you or another person who is ill and you believe something miraculous has happened, please phone Father Robichaud at 202-269-2519 and tell him your story.