Reflections on Palautian Spirituality

Sr. Bridget Eze, CM
Nigeria

From early childhood Fr. Francisco Palau was aware of a burning force of Passionate Love which animated his life as echoed in his writing “My Relations with the Church”: “God wrote this law with his own finger in the stratums of my heart: you must love with all your strength (Mt.22:27). And this efficacious voice created an immense passion in it which made itself felt form my infancy and developed in my youth. I, when I was young love with all my strength because the Law of nature impels me with irresistible impact. What did I love? Who was the beloved object?” This quest for the object of his love consumed him and moved him into a determined search for the object of his love that constitutes the meaning of his existence.

He searched for his beloved through the austerities of religious life, in fasting, in silence in poverty. “I search for her and found her! I saw my loved one and I united myself to her in faith, hope and love”. At this time of search, Fr. Palau was attentive to the voice and action of the Holy Spirit within him, and to the signs of the times revealed in the external circumstances of the historical period. He fought zealously to defend the Catholic faith in Spain with all his might; which at that time or instance he knew as a divine institution. Within forty years of search the object of his love was revealed to him in his spiritual conversation as the Church. “Your beloved exists and lives; she is a moral being, perfect and complete just as an individual. Your beloved is God and neighbor…This perfect being is the Holy Church.”

This encounter became the central focus of his life and the object of his relations in his spiritual and apostolic exercises. In this spirit he identified his mission as “My mission is to announce to the people that you are infinitely beautiful and lovable, and to tell them to love you. Love of God and love of neighbor: this is the object of my mission”. In this authentic, determined and humble manner, Fr. Palau sought and discovered his beloved and was transformed in her who is the moving force behind his perseverance, spiritual zeal, apostolic services and paternity in the Church; and he is alive even today.