The word obedience derives from the Latin ob and audire, meaning in English, “to listen to.” Obedience in the widest
sense entails the graced openness of people to the providential meaning of events in their life…. Disobedience is the
proud stance of people who isolate themselves from the flow of divine disclosures in everydayness…. The openness
asked of us by Jesus is not merely a question of gathering information; it invites us also to develop a disposition of
surrender to anything that manifests itself as a possible disclosure of the divine direction of our life.
Fr. Adrian van Kaam and Susan Muto