The Book of Heaven
—Unofficial Version—

March 15, 1908

When souls are all filled with God, storms have no strength to agitate them even slightly.

This morning, I was feeling more than ever oppressed because of the privation of my highest and only good, but at the same time I was placid, without those anxieties that used to make me go round through Heaven and earth, and only when I would find Him, then would I stop. So I was saying to myself: ‘What a change – I feel petrified from the pain of your absence, yet, I do not cry, I feel a profound peace that invests me completely; not a contrary breath enters into me.’ At that moment, blessed Jesus came and told me: "My daughter, do not want to trouble yourself. You must know that when there is a strong storm in the sea, where the waters are deep the storm is only superficial. The depths of the sea are in the most perfect calm, the waters remain tranquil, and the fish, when they detect the storm, go to nest where the water is deeper so as to be safer. So, the whole storm unloads itself where the sea contains very little water, because since there is little water, the storm has the strength to agitate it from top to bottom, and even to transport it elsewhere, to other points of the sea.

So it happens to souls when they are completely filled with God - up to the brim, up to overflowing outside: storms have no strength to upset them even slightly, because there is no strength that can defy God; at the most, they may feel it superficially. Even more, as the soul detects the storm, she puts the virtues in order, and goes to nest in the inmost depths of God. So, while externally there seems to be a storm, it is completely false – it is then that the soul enjoys more peace, and rests, tranquil, in the bosom of God, just like the fish in the bosom of the sea.

All the opposite for the souls who are empty of God, or contain just a little bit of God: storms agitate them all over; and if they have a little bit of God, they waste it. Nor does it take strong storms to agitate them; the slightest wind is enough to make virtues flee from them. Even more, holy things themselves, which form a delicious pasture for those former souls who enjoy them to their fill, for these souls, turn into storms. They are knocked about by all the winds; from no side is it ever dead calm for them, because reason demands that where the whole of God is not, the inheritance of peace is far away from them."