When Blessed Nicolas Bunkerd Kitbamrung, a parish priest, was arrested and imprisoned (on his way to martyrdom), he was given the opportunity to teach and to catechize, just because people were there. He took it. It was not the way he’d imagined his life going. He took the opportunity anyway.

When Saint Maximilian Kolbe was in Auschwitz, he was given the opportunity to save a life. He took it. It was not the way he’d imagined his life going. He took the opportunity anyway.

When Blessed Charles de Foucauld was living in Algeria and given the opportunity to forge a new way of living with people as a contemplative, he (eventually) took it. It was not the way he’d imagined his life going. He (eventually) took the opportunity anyway.

When the saints were given opportunities, they took them. But what does it mean to be given an opportunity?

You can’t listen if you don’t hear. What, or rather who, opens opportunities is the Holy Spirit. He works in the secrets of hearts. He leads by those dispositions of docility that are called Gifts of the Holy Spirit. That’s how the saints heard. Then they listened. Then they did, then they acted.

We cannot imagine how God will lead us. This extends truly into our relationships with our neighbours. We cannot imagine or plan our relationships with our neighbours. This is true in purely natural, human terms. It’s just as true in terms of grace and God’s plan. Expect the unexpected! There is only one way to remain open enough, available enough for people in their humanity, available enough for suffering, available enough for prayer or intercession and prayer of contemplation, available enough for the world in all its contrasts and all its highlights… And that is to be humiliated and humble, to enter, however tentatively or however surely, into the paths of contemplation, passio divinorum, love of God, suffering the deep things of God, in the summit of our soul.