If

"If we reach out and meet God here where God is, if we accept God's will in life where our will does not prevail, if we are willing to learn from others, if we can see ourselves for what we are and grow from that, if we can live simply, if we can respect others and reverence them, if we can be a trusting part of our world without having to strut  around it controlling it, changing it, wrenching it to our own image and likeness, then we will have achieved "perfect love that casts out fear" (1 John 4:18). There will be nothing left to fear - not God's wrath, not the loss of human respect, not the absence of control, not the achievements of others greater than our own whose success we have had to smother with rejection or deride with scorn." 

Sister Joan Chittister, The Rule of St. Benedict