Note 957 — Chapter II · THE TREATMENT OF PENITENTS IN DIFFERENT EXTERNAL CIRCUMSTANCES

To deny absolutely the existence of a vocation under such circumstances is too severe a doctrine; higher and purer motives may exist along with those of a distinctly lower order, and the aim of the confessor should then be to foster the higher motives while eliminating the lower ones. Great caution, unquestionably, should be used where inferior motives are detected, but we should never lose sight of the possibility of God’s grace being granted to those whose ideals are not at first of the very highest order.