This receptive condition St Paul achieved at an early stage.  The first essential was penitence, and therefore, after his three days of utter solitude which elapsed between his vision and his Baptism, he retired to live a hermit’s life in the desert for about two and a half years (see Galatians 1:17).  During those long months, as the summers and winters passed, as he reflected on the unplumbed depths of the love of God and of his own hateful rebellion, his grief must have been as bitter and distressing as any human being is capable of.  But at the same time his resolution henceforth to live, to suffer, and if need be to die, for Our Lord was equally fierce and determined.

Thus the second essential condition for absorbing the holiness of God and uniting his soul with Our Blessed Lord, was faith.  This began as a startling trust in Our Lord which the vision outside Damascus rendered unshakeable.  Thereafter he knew that no power on earth or in Hell could separate him from the love and power of God which is in Jesus Christ.  And it grew into the complete consecration of his whole self to Christ who became the living centre of his being and existence.  His faith was increasingly deepened by much concentrated prayer in which all his tremendous energies of mind and spirit were focused on reaching out to God in love and longing.