Why is it so difficult to trust? Why do we struggle to honestly say the psalmist’s words, “In you, my God, I place my trust?” Fr. Rolheiser writes that we fail to understand the need to surrender. Emotionally, psychologically, and sexually the deepest imperative inside us is simply to surrender. The entire gospel can be summed up in that ultimate threshold we must cross to accept the reality that we need God because, in the end, we cannot take care of ourselves, make ourselves whole, and hide our weaknesses from each other. We need to surrender, trust, and let ourselves fall into stronger and safer hands than our own. But to do this, we need to trust, trust that it is safe to love, let go, reveal who we really are, show weakness, and not have to pretend that we are whole and self-reliant. How do we move towards trust? We need to be willing to open ourselves to vulnerability. Ruth Burrows, the British Carmelite, writes that surrender and abandonment are like a deep, inviting, frightening ocean into which we are drawn. We make excursions into it to test it, to see whether it’s safe, to enjoy the sensation of it. But, for all kinds of reasons, we always go back to dry land, to solid ground, to where we are safe. But the ocean beckons us out anew, and we risk again being afloat in something bigger than ourselves. And we keep doing that, wading in and then going back to safety, until one day, when we are ready, we just let the waters carry us away.