Thence she melted into a river of tears, and said in a sweet glow of love: “O sweet and good Jesus, where were You when my soul was in such affliction?” Sweet Jesus, the Spotless Lamb, replied: “I was beside you. For I move not, and never leave My creature, unless the creature leave Me by mortal sin.” And that woman remained in sweet conversation with Him, and said: “If You were with me, how come I didn’t feel You there? How can it be that being by the fire, I should not feel the heat? And I felt nothing but freezing cold, sadness, and bitterness, and seemed to myself full of mortal sins.”

He replied sweetly and said: “… I will that from this darkness you derive the light of self-knowledge, in which you can gain the virtue of humility, and joy and exult in a good will, knowing that I abide in you secretly… But do you know in what way I dwell in you? In the same way that I hung on the Cross. And I take the same way with you that My Father took with Me. Reflect, daughter of Mine, that upon the Cross I was blessed and was sorrowful… And know why I do all this: only to make a soul reach true perfection.”
Saint Catherine of Siena