Sister Faustina Kowalska: Her LIfe and MIssion

THE PATH TO THE CONVENT Helenka h e s ita ted no longer. The very though t th a t Je su s m igh t suffer through h e r was unbearable. Her decision was made: from now on, everything was to be subordinated to h e r main aim - the giving of he rse lf to the service of God. In h e r situation , th is decision was an act no t only of heroic courage, b u t of heroic t r u s t in God. There were so m an difficulties and of such a k ind th a t , hum an ly speaking, there were no chances of overcoming them. Wherever she tu rned , the re was only darkness. Only th e voice of the Lord, calling h e r to Himself, was the S ta r of Bethlehem to Helenka, ligh ting h e r pa th sufficiently b righ tly to give h e r the courage to take the decisive step. Nevertheless the question she had been asking he rse lf over the la s t few yea rs - how to go about en te ring a convent - by no m eans suddenly became eas ier and simpler to answer. R a the r th e reverse - i t took on dram a tic urgency. According to th e previously offered advice of h e r confessor, and th e Divine call, Helenka ough t to go to Warsaw and the re apply to one of the many religious Congregations to be adm itted. But where was she to stay a fte r arriving? W ith whom? W ha t was to be h e r base while she applied? She did not know the city, or anyone in it. The only city she h ad known so fa r was Lodz - i t was not so fa r from home, known to her, and many th read s of h e r life were bound up w ith it. How was such an inexperienced girl 41