PRAYER FOR THE GRACE TO AGE WELL

PRAYER FOR THE GRACE TO AGE WELL

By Teilhard de Chardin, The Divine Milieu

(found among Brother Conrad’s possessions)

 

When the signs of age begin to mark my body,

and still more when they touch my mind;

When the illness that is to diminish me or carry me off strikes from without

or is born within me;

When the painful moment comes to which I suddenly awaken to the fact that I am growing ill

or growing old; and

Above all at the last moment when I feel I am losing hold of myself and am absolutely passive

within the hands of the great unknown forces that have formed me,

In all these dark moments, 0 God,

Grant that I may understand that it is you—provided only my faith is strong enough—

who is painfully parting the fibers of my being in order to penetrate to the very

marrow of my substance and bear me away within yourself.