The Word of God, spiritual reading, and compassion are all remedies for aridity.

• Spiritual Reading and the Word of God

• The Compassion of Adoration

When people came to him to talk about aridity, Pierre referred everyone to the deep meaning of prayer and Adoration: that we may begin to love the Lord and He may transform our hearts by His love.

We can think back over everything the Lord has done for us. How did we meet Him? Thank Him for that. See if we still remain as alive and as on fire with Him now, or if we have allowed ourselves to become slightly cold.

It is especially in Adoration that Jesus invites us to turn to others to see them and love them in a practical way with Him, with His eyes and His heart.

Of course, Pierre knew that sometimes the Lord withdraws so that we will love Him more. But often, he said, we are in aridity perhaps because we are not in compassion. […] It is obvious that, normally, through Adoration our hearts should be open and, really, we should be compassionate. That’s what is important.

• Compassion for Jesus

Pierre readily recalled that the first person to love in prayer is Jesus Himself, in His humanity.

We are experiencing aridity. OK. Well, let us say to ourselves: “Jesus is a very sick man. He lives in the dark. […] Nobody hears Him. He is so tired, He cannot speak, He is dying.” So He is there and then we stay close to Him. We are bored, but we shouldn’t get bored because He is suffering. So we’re moved to compassion. We tell Him, “Lord, do not leave me with such a hard heart, let me have a compassionate heart so I can live with You and love You!”

We are at Adoration. We find compassion, because He is suffering terribly, poor Jesus! So, we wake up, we stay awake, we keep ourselves awake. We’re not activists, but our attitude is “not soft”. Jesus is in agony until the end of the world. It is not a time to be going to sleep!

This advice was helpful to many people, and it is still helpful.

So close to Jesus we are doing our apprenticeship in compassion. And in this way He continues to soften our hearts and open them to charity.

People say they are experiencing aridity. […] When you are with Jesus who is suffering, you suffer too, you understand. And you do not feel the aridity so much! Or else it is a spiritual dryness, which is really given by God. So at this point, we really rest … we cling to the Lord and we don’t have a “cold heart” but we’re all smiles.