Don’t you see? Working at a good hard task is still a prayer (Joan of Arc).

Charles Péguy (1873-1914)
Writer and poet

“As for me, I am a good Christian like everyone else, I say my prayers like everyone, I’m a good parishioner like everyone. Eh! I say my prayers every morning and evening, my Our Father and my Hail Mary to begin and end my day. And that fills up my day – sure, that is enough to fill up my day, to hold me through the day, to keep my heart strong all day long, and to get me through. I’m a good Christian. You say your two prayers like you eat your three meals, just as natural. It’s the same thing, that’s what makes a day. You don’t eat all day, just like you don’t pray all day. I’m a good parishioner. I also say the Angelus in the morning and the Angelus in the evening. Whatever I’m doing, I pause a moment to say it, naturally, like an answer to the bells. I’m a good parishioner, from the parish of Domrémy. I go to catechism like everyone else, and on Sunday I go to the village for Mass and church like all the rest. Only, for me, Sunday can’t look like every other day of the week, and every other day of the week like Sunday. Nor can the times for prayer be like all the other times of the day, or the other times of the day be like the times for prayer. If that weren’t the case, it would be like there wasn’t any Sunday at all. Nor any time for prayer, during the day. Then there would be no point in having Sunday at all. You mustn’t work on Sundays, but you must work during the week. There is one day for God, and the other days are for work. Work, that is prayer. I go to catechism on Sunday mornings before Mass. There is time for everything, and sufficient for the hour is the trouble therein. And the work. Each thing in its time. Work, pray, it’s all natural, and it comes all on its own.” (The mystery of the charity of Joan of Arc)

Charles Péguy (1873-1914)
Writer and poet