Henri Boulad: All is Grace

Since I found it in my library a couple of days ago, I have been reading the fascinating book "All is Grace" by the Jesuit scholar Fr. Henri Boulad. We bought the book in 2003 when Fr. Boulad came to Toronto for the first time. "All is Grace" is subtitled "Man and the Mystery of Time." The book is a collection of lectures given by him mostly in Alexandria, Egypt. In it, Fr. Boulad speaks of human life and compares it to nature - plants and trees and much more of God's creation then introduces true love as the much needed recovery of life in today's civilization of fast-accumulated, yet superstitious, knowledge through technology really needs renewal...
Here is a little excerpt from page 71 where he speaks how he learned and where did his knowledge lead him to:
[That's culture: a tree that grows, not a truck one fills; this new knowledge can be a sparkling spring. Here are two quotations from the contemporary Swiss theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar:
Patience is the prime virtue of any one who wants to learn; Only what has disappeared in the ear can be born in the heart.
And I would add: Only what has been born in the heart can be repeated by the tongue........
One day is not enough. It takes days and days until, little by little, the tree reveals its soul to us. It is the same with human beings. It takes time to get to know us, to discover us, because human beings do not reveal themselves all at once; they take time to uncover their souls. And that presupposes a look, a long look; waiting, long waiting; patience, long patience; until the other reveals himself or herself in a truth and a mystery which is very different from what we had originally imagined.
It is the same with God. It takes time to get to know God and discover God. And that presupposes that one takes time to pray. God does not reveal himself to anyone who is in a hurry. To penetrate his mystery, you have to take time, all your time.] In his book, Fr. Boulad recalls that he saw the corrections La Fontaine made to his classic fables - "A simple little fable which seemed to have sprung straight from La Fontaine's pen was, in fact, the result of scrupulous correction and patient labour."
Fr. Boulad quotes from philosophers works such as Sartre's view of God "God is a 'voyeur' who tries to see through the keyhole what is going on in my room, what is going on in my heart" which turned Sartre to an atheist...Boulad also quotes from ' Nietzsche's "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" depicting the gaze of Jesus upon Judas and Judas reaction of double-murder (betraying Jesus to death on the cross, and his murder of himself in despair), the French Jean Lacroix' book "The Feeling of Guilt" where the philosopher distinguishes between two different attitudes: remorse and repentance! In the psychology of Sigmund Freud remorse is Boulad sees remorse a self-punishment all-too evident in Christian tradition for atonement of guilt and sees man's hope and faith in repentance. God has always loved his creation and would never be punishing. Boulad also quotes the poets Rudyard Kipling and Victor Hugo that expressed joy in not doubting God's forgiveness and love. He refers to the Biblical witness culminating in the transforming power of Jesus Christ, his love, and his healing, always patient and understanding. The problem of today's schools and colleges is, I agree, a hidden atheism since God is pictured as the tyrant judge of humanity, so he must be forgotten...This is not the image of the true Triune God, ever loving who himself is love (1 John 4:8). I heard Fr. Boulad speak about God "the communion of love" at Holy Family Coptic Catholic parish in his visit to Toronto in 2003 and wrote about it here: https://todayquestions.blogspot.com/2008/06/trinity-divine-communion-of-love.html