Spirituality of the Religious Life According to St. Stanislaus Papczyński 66 is also Christian faith, because faith allows one to see things that men are not capable of knowing on their own. Through faith, man learns the mysteries of God that concern both His life and His essence, as well as in the events in salvation history and in the lives of individual persons. Particularly significant here are the salvific actions performed by Christ and described by the New Testament, as well as Christ’s redeeming work through the sacraments. This way of seeing the place and importance of the faith is quite characteristic for theMarianFounder. Krzyżanowski remarks that Papczyński’s entire spiritual doctrine, in which he presents the path of striving for perfect love, is permeated with the spirit of a living and supernatural faith. Frequently described implicite, his doctrine plays the role of guidelines for man in the aspect of the supernatural as well as the moral life.116 In his Inspectio cordis, Papczyński directly addresses the analogy that he observes between faith and the experience of illumination of people that strive on the path of Christian holiness; for this reason – we may assume – he uses definitions pertaining to illumination in its description.117 Saint Stanislaus Papczyński bases his convictions on, among other things, the gospel description of St. Peter’s profession (Mt 16:13-19) which “overcame his erroneous opinion about Jesus” based only on the light of the “human intellect” of those who “immerse themselves in the affairs of flesh and blood.” Peter, “by a very powerful act of professing God” which he made thanks to his faith, and also because he was “more enlightened than the others”, revealed the truth that Jesus “is the Son of the Living God.”118 Faith introduces Papczyński’s theology, which is confirmed not only by the book under the same title, written as a handbook of spirituality for lay people, but also the constantly recurring idea of the “human soul,” the “depth of the heart,” of a “dwelling” in a human being where God resides. 116 Cf. C. Krzyżanowski, Stanislaus a Jesu Maria…, pp. 229-230. 117 The meditation on Jn 20:29 is characteristic here: “‘Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed.’ Consider that the Son of God also had you in mind then; for although you did not see him among men with your corporal eyes, yet today you believed that he, concealed under the species of bread, is present [f.146r] on the altar; and you adored him and hospitably admitted him into your heart. Praise the Lord for this illumination” IC, p. 951. 118 It is worth quoting here the passage in question in its original Latin, because it perfectly illustrates the matter at hand: “1. «Quem dicunt homines esse filium
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