As we all know from our first hand experience, the wounds in our nature—ignorance, malice, weakness, and concupiscence—plague our best efforts at building a coherent and integrated life aimed at lasting happiness. Once the defect of sin takes root, it tends to produce more sins, and habits of certain sins called vices are built up and they become difficult to resist and dispel from our actions. And the truth is that all of our efforts to achieve a state of happiness are powerless, despite the longing of our hearts for a return to the peace and rest of friendship with God. The happiness of which human beings are capable in a state of separation from God is minimal, fleeting, and deeply unsatisfying. If we resigned ourselves to this form of happiness as all that is possible for us, the appropriate response would be complete despair and the human story would take the form of a tragedy.
Yet, “ … we have not been abandoned …!” Thank you, Gideon, for this timely instruction - and the HOPE it inspires!