"There is nothing which gives greater security to our actions, or more effectively cuts the snares the devil lays for us, than to follow another person's will, rather than our own, in doing good...When the devil has failed in making man fall, he puts forward all his energies to create distrust between the penitent and the confessor, and so little by little he gains his end at last...Obedience is the true holocaust which we sacrifice to God on the altar of our hearts... The good works which we do of our own will are not so meritorious as those that are done under obedience... When tribulations, infirmities, and contradictions come, we must not run away in a fright, but vanquish them like men. It is not enough to see that God wishes the good we aim at, but that he wishes it through our instumentality, in our manner and in our time; and we may come to discern all this by true obedience."
From If God Be With Us: The Maxims of St. Philip Neri, Fr. F. Faber, ed., Gracewing, U.K.
It's for stuff like this that I subscribe to Magnificat.
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