Do not neglect in your efforts for healing, in which possibility we must believe, but at the same time, surrender to the power of the One who, in order to have you with Him, uses painful and trivial trials, of which He has already permitted so many in your life. Although I have always attributed fundamental, primary importance to human effort and development, I also acknowledge that the soul begins to know God at the moment it is forced to truly diminish in Him. Surrender yourself to our Lord and let yourself be carried by Him, yes? Beneath what seems empty and frightening to you, you will discover solid ground, resilient to all fluctuations and shocks of everyday life…
(Pierre Teilhard de Chardin SJ /1881–1955/, letter to a cousin, January 11, 1919;
quoted from the book Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Birth of Thinking. Letters 1914–1919, Malvern 2021)
