“Our desire for God is nothing compared to his desire for us. He loves us and desires us infinitely more than we can desire and love him. Our desire can have highs and lows, but God‘s desire to love us can never diminish or be extinguished. Despite our infidelity and lukewarmness, God will always want to love us, give himself to us, to save us.

“And it is this desire of his that can awaken and stimulate ours. We must believe in it, offer ourselves to it, without ever becoming discouraged in the face of our destitution. We must believe that God wants to wed us in spite of our ugliness and, believing, allow him to do it. It is he whose gaze will make us worthy and clothe us in beauty.” ~Fr. Jacques Philippe, excerpt from The Eight Doors of the Kingdom: meditations on the beatitudes (p. 137)