Praying brings Therese into communion with her mother, her father and her sisters. For part of her experience in prayer is condltíoned by the presence of beloved persons: the presence of human love is a sort of token for the hidden presence of God. How otherwise can a child be trained in prayer, in realizing the hidden presence, except by the sacrament of visible, tangible love? Therese is taken into their prayer and nestles there.
Whenever I experience God playing in my heart, I feel excitement and wonder. I am never really clear what has happened except that I begin to see old things in new ways. The whole of the experience seems more than the sum of its parts and the more I ponder the experience, the more I discover in it.