Confession

p. 25 (3)



If only someone could have imposed restraint on my disorder.
That would have transformed to good purpose the fleeting experiences
of beauty in these lowest of things, and afixed limits to indulgence in their charms...
...For You (O LORD) shape the propagation of our mortal race,
imposing Your gentle Hand to soften the brambles
which You have excluded from Your paradise.
Your omnipotence is never far from us, even when we are far from You...

Alternatively, I ought to have paid more vigilant heed to the voice from Your clouds..
"Nevertheless those who are married shall have trouble in the flesh, and I would spare you" (Cor. 7:28) and
"He who has no wife thinks on the things of God, how he can please God. But he who is joined in marriage thinks on the affairs of the world, how he can please his wife." (1 Cor. 7:1).
Had I paid careful attention to these sayings, and "become a eunuch for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven" (Matt. 19:12), I would have been happier finding fulfillment in your embraces...
But in my misery I seethed...abandoning You.

p. 27 (7)


Wretch that I am, do I dare to say that You, my God, were silent, when in truth I ventured, still, further from You?
Was it in this sense that You kept Your silence toward me?
Then whose words were they, but Yours?
(Whose words were they, but Yours?)