The Isolation of the Soul

Examining the theme of loss and the isolation of the human soul through the thinking of Chesterton, Belloc, and Baring, this paper considers some of the theological, moral, and psychological matters — both the causes and the effects — while always remaining rationally and resolutely convinced of their finally irreducible mysterious nature: mysteries of human free will and divine grace and of the purity and integrity of the co-operating human heart. Indeed, that human heart retains, until death, “the permanent possibility of voluntary defection” from Grace and from God. For, as Catholics believe, God so loved us that He gave us even the capacity, as a created gift and endowment, and the possibility of refusing His love, finally and irrevocably. For, we can only love freely. Of its nature, it cannot be forced.

The Isolation of the Soul