On June 12 of this year a friend of mine texted me, “I keep hearing to tell you to make a print of the Litany of Trust.” It took me four months (June-October) to actually make the print, and another month (November) to finally get this piece written so it could be sent out to all of you. Sometimes the path is slow and weary, sometimes filled with obstacles and distractions, still the path remains and the Lord sustains the light for the way, and all is done in His perfect timing. I trust this Litany is meeting you in a moment of need.

Initially when my friend shared that she kept hearing the Litany of Trust for me, I was sort of ‘eh’ about it. The Litany of Trust wasn’t a prayer I had a special affection for at the time, it wasn’t even one I knew very much about other than the fact that it existed. To be quite honest, I’m pretty certain I had never prayed it before. So I worked on other things that were very much on my heart at the time.

One Saturday morning in October I was working in a coffee shop (Saturday mornings are my one day a week where I get to sneak off sans kiddos for the morning to write and work). I had just completed an email with a new blog post and new prints for my Etsy shop so I began thinking about what I would focus on next. I recalled how my friend encouraged the Litany of Trust months prior so I put my attention there.

I began doing a bit of research on the origins of the Litany and was surprised to find out that this is a rather newly written prayer. I stumbled upon this interview with the Religious Sister that wrote it and was very moved by what she had to say about its origins. If you have the time to watch the brief video I very much encourage you to do so. I think you might find a little piece of yourself in Sister Faustina Maria Pia, S.V. (of the Sisters of Life in NY) as I most certainly have.

I’ve previously written about the Novena of Surrender which similarly has rocked my world. The funny thing about the Litany of Trust is that it really feels like an extension of that Novena. The act of trust is truly an act of surrender to our Lord. Trust and surrender are linked to one another primarily because of what they demand of us. They both are exemplary of God’s mercy and an outright path to deeper relationship with Him and further dependence upon Him.

Sister Maria Faustina speaks about how she received the Litany of Trust from the Lord and tells the preceding circumstances that inspired it’s conception. She recalls a time she was struggling just a few years into her religious life and had a difficult situation she was facing where trust was needed.

Sister says, “I had to make a decision I couldn’t avoid and did not know which way to go, could not hear where God wanted me to go, and it went on for months. Just months of you know this blankness almost, like you know you’re walking into a room and just cannot feel anything.

The biggest grace I think for the foundation of learning how to trust, God gave me in a very clear way in that situation because I realized I wanted to know what God wanted for me. I wanted to hear God’s voice, and I realized that was already a beginning of trusting. I’m like, I want to know what You want from me, um because somehow I knew that that would be good. And yet I didn’t realize at the time that I didn’t just want to know what God wanted but I also wanted to know why, and I was holding out for the whys. Like, if you want me to do this, well why, why would you let me suffer these things, why would you allow these things to happen?

In a beautiful way I was praying in my room one night, um just before a simple crucifix and I, yeah I had an experience. It was very simple, but very profound, um in my own heart, where I was having this conversation quite openly with the Lord saying like if you just told me why, if you just explained things to me, then I would give an easy yes, you know. And I felt like the Lord, just in His tenderness in that moment broke a little bit of that darkness of the months prior, and kind of lifted my eyes to His in a way to say I don’t want you to give your yes to a bunch of circumstances that can fit into your realm of understanding. I want you to give your yes, this precious gift that you have of choosing, of willing, of desiring, I want you to give that to Me. And it was almost as though He was saying, like, am I enough?

You know, and that is really the question that trust asks, is God saying you trust me not for what necessarily I give you or what you understand about me, but do you trust me as a person, um as a Father, as a God, as a friend, right? And so, in that moment, it became beautifully, painfully clear that I actually was holding on to something that really wasn’t important. What was really important in that moment was this consent to God. This free, whole-hearted consent, um to give Him this unconditional yes that He had given me in creating me and loving me into life.”

One fruit of Sister’s profound moment with Christ was the creation of the Litany of Trust. She shares, “I needed trust, and God gave me a way to ask for it.” Sister recalls that the Litany of Trust poured from her in the moments following her realization that she needed to trust God with every aspect of her life, to trust not for what God can give or what she could understand about Him, but despite those things.

Like Sister Faustina Maria Pia, we hold on to things that are not important, and those things can impede our trust. God desires our free, whole-hearted consent to give Him an unconditional yes. Articulating her struggles of life with the Lord created space for God to come in and meet her, allowing her to give God permission to do what He wanted in her life and to show love through her. Now we can see how that moment of surrender and trust in God, that moment of complete vulnerability produced a great fruit not only for Sister Faustina in her life, but for all of us who have been gifted with this beautiful Litany of Trust.

This should be affirmation to you that your desire to hear God’s voice and your desire to know what God wants for you is a beginning of trust, it is a recognition that His will for you is good.

Keep going, friend. If you desire what He desires you are on the right path. Peel back the layers and keep diving in, go deeper and deeper into that yes, even if you can’t see how it could possibly work out. Ask yourself, is God enough for me?

If you too are struggling to trust without conditions in some area of your life or you simply want to learn to trust God more freely, I encourage you to turn to the Litany of Trust to aid in your surrender and deeper trust in the Lord.

Have no fear,
Jackie