Reading a sermon of Ronald Knox’s the other day, I was struck by one phrase. He speaks of ‘the joy of conflict, without which there is little savour to living, except for the few who live very close to God’. Tomorrow is the great day of her whom the liturgy compares to a castrorum acies ordinata, an army set in array. In these strange and critical days for the Church, perhaps we should ask Mary for a holy joy of battle.
Laodicea 
August 15, 2017 at 6:08 am
Thank you for your this. Only, should we not all aim for ‘being very close to God’? Is it therefore elicit to feel joy in conflict?
August 15, 2017 at 6:09 am
Also, just out of interest : Do you happen to know when Fr. Knox wrote this?
August 15, 2017 at 5:25 pm
We should certainly aim above all else to be very close to God.
It is licit to feel joy in conflict if the conflict is just and justly waged. In fact, it is more praiseworthy, in these circumstances, to feel joy than not to feel joy, since it is characteristic of a virtuous man to feel joy when doing a virtuous action, whereas it is characteristic of one who is still acquiring virtues to do the same action with repugnance.
The editor of Knox’s sermons was not certain of the date of this one, but said that it was probably from 1938..