feelings and the deeper strata of their being.”32 She insists that “a woman has the mission to encourage
her husband, by reverent listening, to ‘open up’, and share with her what is on his heart and mind.”33
To accomplish this receptive love Lily writes:
Trust this bright Tabor vision you've been given. Daily rekindle it in your heart and let it nurture
your love.... let it form the cornerstone of your faithfulness.34 ... when you suspend your Tabor
vision of Michael and look at him from the outside with a critical, unloving attitude of the stranger,
the sweet intimacy between you is shattered. It belongs to the pact of love not to isolate single
expressions or mannerisms from the totality of the other person.35
Retaining the openness to her husband's totality
without pettiness brings fulfillment. Alice von
Hildebrand extolls a woman's receptive love by
recalling that a wife's greatest joy is, “to know that her
husband shares everything with her, and wants to do so,
because he trusts her, because he trusts her wisdom,
because he trusts her love.”36
This can be applied to other relationships as
well. She writes, “There is something analogous
between married life and religious life, ‘Speak, Lord,
thy servant is listening’(1 Sam 3:10).”37 By quoting the prophet Samuel who humbly listened for the
Lord's voice, Alice von Hildebrand points towards the humility which is essential to place oneself at the
service of others. Only by reverent self-giving is a woman open to the gift of understanding which
ennobles her, and provides those in her care with greater access to God's wisdom. She affirms a
woman's special gift for empathy writing in “Woman as Wife”:
The very special talent given to women is to enter into the feelings of others, to perceive their needs,
to share their sorrow, and to rekindle their hopes. God has made the woman other centered.38
This very special talent is a service required of each woman to preserve a loving vision of that person,
which holds out to the world the hope of glory for that person, a loving vision which inspires and
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
Ibid.
Ibid.
Hildebrand, By Love Refined: Letters to a Young Bride, 13.
Ibid., 33.
Hildebrand, "Woman as Wife," in Only Heroic Catholic Families Will Survive, 94.
Hildebrand, By Love Refined: Letters to a Young Bride, 33.
Hildebrand, "Woman as Wife," in Only Heroic Catholic Families Will Survive, 94.
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