Never, in statu viae, will he cease to say with Michelangelo, “Lord, take me away from myself, and make me pleasing to Thee.” In his earthly life the Christian must never let the process of dying unto himself and rising again in Christ come to a standstill; he should always preserve that inner fluidity which is an ultimate expression of the situation implied in the status viae, Thus spoke the thief on the cross: “We are punished justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this man hath done no evil. Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy kingdom.” In that moment, a bursting through toward things divine took place in his soul, which bore a connotation of unlimited love. And, because this unlimited surrender was the last act of his life before expiring, in spite of all his imperfections he received this answer from the Lord: “Amen, I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:42-43).

That unlimited readiness to change is necessary not only for the sinner in the narrower sense of the word, but also for the guarded, the pure, the graced, whom God has drawn unto Himself from youth onwards: not only for a St. Augustine but also for a St. John. The saints are classed sometimes in two categories: on the one hand, the great converts like St. Paul or St. Mary Magdalene; on the other, men and women in whom a continuous slow maturing of grace is clearly observable: such souls as St. John the Evangelist or St. Catherine of Siena. Yet the necessity of what is here described as readiness to change applies by no means only to him who has gone through a conversion and who therefore evidently cannot but repent of his former life, but even to such as have never definitely and gravely trespassed against God’s commandments. They, too, must be willing to rise above their nature and hold themselves ready for coinage by the spirit of Christ.

Supernatural readiness to change vs. malleability

However, it would mean a grievous misunderstanding of this indispensable basic attitude to interpret it as a state of fluidity as such, a general disposition to change in no matter what direction. In fact, what we have in mind is exclusively the readiness to let ourselves be shaped by Christ, and by whatever speaks of Him and of the “Father of all lights.” The change we have in view is merely the change implied in the continual process of dying unto ourselves, and being reformed by Christ. Moreover, that state of fluidity which makes this process possible is linked, on the other hand, to an attitude of consolidation in Christ and in the goods we receive from Him. With the postulate of soft receptiveness susceptible to the formative influences from above corresponds, as a logical complement, the postulate of an increasing rigidity in relation to all tendencies towards being changed from below.

Here the difference between fluidity under the sign of the supernatural and the mere natural disposition of fluidity becomes clear. Some people, owing merely to their natural temperament are like soft wax, prone to any change whatever. These impressionable persons who yield to all kinds of influences lack solidity and continuity.