Among the practices Jesus teaches Luisa Piccarreta in the Book of Heaven, there is one that returns constantly, like a breathing: Luisa "makes her round", "makes her tour", in the Divine Will. The Italian word is giri — "tours" — rendered in English sometimes as rounds, sometimes as tours. Concretely, the soul traverses in spirit all the works of God — the heavens and the stars, the sun and the sea, the flowers and the birds, the angels and the saints, the souls of the past, the present and the future — to deposit its love there and render to God, in the name of the whole of creation, the glory creatures owed Him.
At first reading, the image can be disorienting: is this just a pious daydream, an imaginary stroll through a beautiful spiritual landscape? The answer of the doctrine is firm and precise: no. The round is not imagination; it is, in Luisa's vocabulary, a divine act — an act God accomplishes in the creature who lives in His Will, whose scope embraces all times. The theologian Joseph Iannuzzi — doctoral thesis defended at the Pontifical Gregorian University (22 November 2012) — puts it in a decisive distinction: "If all the rounds in the Divine Will are divine acts in the Divine Will, not all divine acts are rounds"[1].
This article therefore explains, step by step, what making the rounds means: first the word and its definition; then why Jesus asks it — it is the whole wound of Adam that must be repaired; then how a round through creation concretely unfolds; finally the unheard-of fruits it produces, and the safeguards that preserve it from any deviation. What is taken for granted here is the act that opens its door — fusing oneself in the Divine Will — to which a companion article is devoted.
What is a "round" in the Divine Will?
Before setting out its why and how, the exact meaning of the word must be fixed. A round is neither a sentimental devotion, nor a visualization, nor a concentration exercise: it is a precise, situated act, which presupposes an antecedent state and produces a real effect.
Luisa's word: giri, "tours", "rounds"
In the thirty-six volumes of the Book of Heaven, Luisa continually uses the verb "to make" with the word giro (plural giri): she "makes her round", she "makes her tour", in creation and Redemption. The English renderings hesitate between "tour", "round" and "circuit" — three words for a single reality. The verb is not incidental: it says a journey, a movement that passes from work to work leaving nothing aside. Luisa recounts it almost like a diary:
"I was making my usual round to follow the Divine Will in all Creation, and my sweet Jesus, manifesting Himself in me, said to me: 'My daughter, how surprising is the action of the soul in My Will!'" — Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, January 9, 1927[2]
The word "usual" matters: the round is not a rare exploit; it is the ordinary activity of a soul who lives in the Divine Will. Luisa takes it up each day, as one takes up a beloved work.
A definition: traversing all the works of God in order to render them to Him
A tight definition can be given. Making a round means: (1) entering the Divine Will through the act of fusion; (2) traversing, one after another, the works of God — those of Creation, those of Redemption, those of Sanctification; (3) recognizing in each one the love God deposited there; (4) imprinting upon it one's own "I love You", one's adoration, reparation and thanks; (5) gathering the whole and offering it to the Father, in the name of all creatures who neglected to do so.
Jesus Himself describes this journey as a commission He addresses to Luisa:
"This is the reason why I urge you to go around all Our works, Creation and Redemption, so that you may place your 'I love You,' your adoration, your gratitude, your thanks, upon all Our works." — Jesus to Luisa, The Book of Heaven, vol. 19, September 13, 1926[3]
Everything is said. The round is not made in order to contemplate beautiful landscapes: it is made to deposit an act of love upon each divine work and render it to God laden with that love. Luisa accompanies her round with a refrain that Jesus says He tenderly appreciated:
"Supreme Majesty, Your little daughter comes to You, upon Your paternal knees, to ask that all may know Your FIAT, Your Kingdom […]. I am not the only one asking You, but with me, all Your works and Your own Will. It is therefore in the name of all that I ask You, I implore Your FIAT." — Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 19, September 13, 1926[4]
A round is not daydreaming: a divine act, not a pious imagining
This is where the whole seriousness of the practice is decided. The round could be mistaken for a simple poetic meditation on the beauty of the world. It is not. Iannuzzi explains why by going back to the origin: when God breathed life into Adam, He made Himself an "actor" in man and gave his "first acts" the power to be modeled on the very acts of God. Every act accomplished by a soul living in the Divine Will thus becomes a divine act — an act of God in the creature, which "has an impact on all things of all times"[5].
The round is a particular case of these divine acts: the one whose property is to cover the whole of creation. Iannuzzi states it plainly:
"If all the rounds in the Divine Will are divine acts in the Divine Will, not all divine acts are rounds; rounds are only one type among so many others of divine acts. […] If the rounds are divine acts that the soul accomplishes throughout the whole of creation, and which can be made at any moment of the day, the prevenient act, for its part, is made at the first rising of the day." — J. L. Iannuzzi, 70 Questions on the Divine Will, Q8[6]
In other words: the meditation on the Hours of the Passion, the morning prevenient act, the works of mercy or the exercise of the virtues in the Divine Will are also divine acts; but the round is distinguished by its cosmic and transtemporal amplitude — it goes from Adam to the last creature to come.
Why make the rounds? The wound of Adam to be repaired
The round is understood only if one grasps what it comes to repair. Its reason for being is not devotional but cosmic: it is about restoring a circulation of love between creation and God, broken by Adam's fall.
Adam carried the whole of creation to God "as in triumph"
Before the fall, Adam lived in the unity of the divine Will. All the acts God accomplished in creation out of love for him, Adam received and rendered to God in a single act, as in a triumph. This is the very archetype of the round. Jesus gives Luisa a dazzled description of it:
"Indeed, as Adam was in the Unity of Our Will, of all Our Acts accomplished in Creation out of love for him, his act was one. By this single act, he brought Us all Our own as in triumph. […] Oh! how happy We were to see him, so rich, so strong, so powerful and of a ravishing beauty, coming toward Us, endowed with all Our works, and bringing them to Us to make Us happy and glorify Us, and to live happily with Us!" — Jesus to Luisa, The Book of Heaven, vol. 24, June 12, 1928[7]
Creation was therefore not a mute backdrop: it was an immense offering that a single man, living in the Divine Will, made rise back up to God, laden with his love. The round is exactly this function — lost, then restored.
The fall broke the circulation
By withdrawing his will from God's, Adam broke this ascent of love. From then on, the works of God remain — the sun shines, the sea murmurs, the angels adore — but no one gathers them anymore to render them to God in the name of all. Creation keeps singing, and the song falls back unoffered. Luisa expresses this desolation with a very strong word that Jesus takes up: one who does not live in the Divine Will is "the pilferer of Creation" — he enjoys God's works without ever rendering them to Him.
"When I make my round in the supreme Will following all its acts in Creation and Redemption, I have the impression that everything speaks to me. Each thing has something to say about this admirable Will! On the other hand, when I am preoccupied with other things, everything is silence." — Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 21, March 26, 1927[8]
Repairing Adam's first act
The round is therefore, at its root, a reparatory act. Arriving in Eden, where Adam withdrew his will from God's, the soul remakes, in the name of Adam and of all creatures, the act he should have made:
"My Love, I want to annihilate my will in Yours so that it may never have life […], in order to repair Adam's first act and render all glory to Your supreme Will as if Adam had never withdrawn from it. […] And I want to make this act as many times as all creatures have done their own will." — Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, October 24, 1926[9]
This is why Jesus links the round so closely to the coming of His Kingdom on earth: for the Kingdom of the Fiat to be formed, the acts of the creature must "suffice" to bear it. The rounds provide precisely these acts.
How is a round made? The soul traversing creation
The practical question remains: how does a round concretely unfold? Luisa left no rigid formula — Saint Annibale Maria di Francia, her censor, recalled that "holiness does not consist in a formula"[10]. But her accounts outline a constant way of proceeding.
The starting point: fusing oneself and recognizing one's nothingness
The round is never a starting point: it presupposes the prior fusion. The soul begins by recognizing its nothingness — "I am nothing, God is everything" — and fixes its will in God's. Only once fused does it receive, in a striking image of Jesus, the "wings" to fly through creation:
"Do you know who takes flight in My Eternal Will so as to move as It does in the sphere of eternity, to be everywhere It is and to do all that It does? It is the soul completely abandoned in My Holy Will. Abandonment gives the wings to be able to fly in My Will." — Jesus to Luisa, The Book of Heaven, vol. 16, February 2, 1924[11]
The act of fusing oneself in the Divine Will is therefore the condition of the round, as wings are the condition of flight. Without fusion, no round — only daydreaming.
Traversing the heavens, the sun, the sea: following the Will in each thing
Once fused, the soul sets out. It does not pass by distractedly: at each work, it stops, recognizes what the Divine Will accomplishes there, and unites itself to that act. Jesus gives Luisa a true lesson on this, station by station:
"Making a round in Creation, when you arrive at the heavens, you too, united with Our Will, love and glorify Our eternity […]. Then, continuing your round in the space of Creation, you will arrive at the sun […]. Do you want to know what My Will does in the sun? It glorifies Our infinite light […] and with its heat, it echoes Our immense love." — Jesus to Luisa, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, November 1, 1926[12]
Each created thing thus becomes a "station" of prayer: at the heavens, the soul adores God's firmness and immutability; at the sun, His light and warmth; at the sea, His immensity. The round turns the entire universe into a book of prayer in which each creature offers a motive for loving.
Imprinting one's "I love You" upon each created thing
The gesture proper to the round is the seal of love deposited upon each work. Luisa "imprints" her "I love You" everywhere she passes:
"I was making my round in Creation and, imprinting my 'I love You' upon each created thing, I was asking that, by virtue of this Divine Will which preserves them beautiful and whole, the Kingdom of the supreme Fiat might come upon the earth." — Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, November 1926[13]
Luisa first worries: created things have no soul — how could they "ask" for the Kingdom? Jesus answers that by virtue of the divine Will running through them, "created things are all noble queens who belong to My royal family", and that, on this account, they have the right to claim the coming of the Reign[14]. The round lends its voice to this mute creation.
The three Fiats: Creation, Redemption, Sanctification
The round is not limited to visible works. It successively traverses the three great works of God, which the Luisian tradition calls the three Fiats: the creative Fiat (the works of Creation), the redemptive Fiat (the whole life and Passion of Christ — heartbeats, tears, wounds, drops of blood), and the sanctifying Fiat (the work of the Holy Spirit in souls). At each stage, the soul gathers everything and offers it. This is what Jesus sums up:
"When you make your round in Our Will, by virtue of this Will, your acts become light and extend to touch the Divinity." — Jesus to Luisa, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, November 2, 1926[15]
The following table situates the round among the other acts made by a soul who lives in the Divine Will.
| Act | When | Scope | Distinctive note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Prevenient act | At the first rising of the day | Anticipates and consecrates all the acts of the day | Fixes the will in God's (vol. 14, May 27, 1922) |
| Current act | At any moment | The present action, replunged into the Will | Revives the morning act obscured by distractions |
| Round / tour | At any moment, often | The whole of creation, from Adam to the last creature | Covers Creation, Redemption, Sanctification; renders all in the name of all |
| Hours of the Passion | Fixed hours | The Passion of Christ hour by hour | Reparatory meditation on the sufferings of Jesus |
The fruits of the rounds
If Jesus "urges" Luisa to make her rounds, it is because of fruits that exceed anything the creature alone could obtain. Four deserve to be singled out.
Rendering to God the glory of all: universal mediation
The first fruit is a universal mediation. Because the Divine Will is present in all things and in each one, the soul that is found there "remains multiplied in all things" and can offer God the love of all creatures:
"Souls who live in My Will, as soon as they enter It, find in act all the acts of the Supreme Majesty; and since this Will is in all things and in each one, these souls remain multiplied in all things and are able to offer Me honor, glory, adoration and love for all." — Jesus to Luisa, The Book of Heaven, vol. 12, February 20, 1919[16]
This capacity to raise others as offerings to the Father is exactly what Iannuzzi treats in question 11 of his 70 Questions: yes, the fused soul can and must offer the Father the acts and lives of all creatures[17]. Its foundation is Christological: because Christ, in His Incarnation, enclosed within Himself the lives of all and remade them divinely, He communicates to the soul who lives in His Will the capacity to share in it — not to remake what is already perfect, but to offer it in the name of all. The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews announced it: "By a single offering, he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified" (Heb 10:14)[18].
Forming the "net of light" that catches souls
A second, more surprising fruit: each round increases the light in the soul, and this light forms a "net" that serves to catch souls for the Kingdom.
"Each time you make your round in My Will, you acquire more light to form the net with which I catch creatures. And do you know what this net is? It is formed of My knowledges. The more I manifest to you knowledges about My eternal Fiat, the more I extend the net for catching the souls who must live in My Kingdom." — Jesus to Luisa, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, November 2, 1926[19]
The round is therefore never sterile nor purely interior: it weaves, knowledge after knowledge, the net by which God will draw other souls. It is a hidden apostolic fruitfulness, without any exterior work.
Acquiring the "possession" of the divine works
The third fruit: by recognizing and loving the works of God, the soul receives a true possession of them — not by its own merit, but by the right of communion God grants to whoever lives in His Fiat. This is the final note, and perhaps the most practical, that Jesus gives:
"If you want My Divine Will to reign, go always around in Our Fiat, recognize all Our works, from the smallest to the greatest, place your little act in each of them, and all will be granted to you." — Jesus to Luisa, The Book of Heaven, vol. 27, October 30, 1929[20]
"Go always around": in five words, the practical definition of the round. Recognizing the works of God is not only a right, Jesus says, "but a possession"[21].
Hastening the Reign of the Fiat on earth
The fourth fruit, which crowns the others: the round prepares the coming of the Reign of the Divine Will. For this Reign to be formed, the acts of the creature must "suffice" to bear it — otherwise, Jesus says, "My Reign does not remain suspended in the air, but descends"[22]. By making her rounds, the soul deposits in each creature "the Reign of the Love of My Will, of adoration, of glory"[23]. Each round is thus a stone laid so that there may come, "on earth as it is in heaven", the Kingdom asked for in the Our Father[24].
The "Rounds" as structured prayer
Beyond the spontaneous circuits Luisa describes in her diary, there is also a set of numbered "Rounds" — a corpus of structured prayers drawn from Luisa's writings, in which each round traverses a precise domain (Creation, the patriarchs, the sacraments, and so on). Iannuzzi cites, for example, the sixth and the nineteenth:
"I continue my flight in the Divine Will and discover the power of the miracles of Moses, the strength of Samson, the holiness of David, the patience of Job — all reflections of the light that Your Divine Will had cast upon them — and I, imprinting upon them the seal of my 'I love You,' implore in the name of all these figures the reign of Your Kingdom." — Luisa Piccarreta, 6th Round in the Divine Will[25]
In the nineteenth, Luisa traverses the sacraments and joins her "I love You" to the baptism administered to each soul[26]. These structured rounds show that the practice is not vague: it can take the form of a concrete, ordered prayer that the soul takes up domain after domain.
Safeguards: neither quietism, nor imagination, nor exemption from the sacraments
A practice so vast calls for clarifications, so that it remains fully Catholic. Three misunderstandings must be set aside.
Not imagination, but a real act in the Will of God
As seen above: the round is a divine act, not a visualization. Its reality does not lie in the vividness of mental images — Luisa insists that it is Jesus, hidden in her, who makes these rounds — but in the real union of the human will with the divine Will. A "round" made by mere imagination, without the fusion that founds it, would be only its shadow. The value of the act, Iannuzzi recalls, depends on its attentiveness and on God's operation in the soul, not on imaginative performance[27].
Not quietism: a true interior martyrdom
Far from being a sweet contemplative drift, the round often involves a share of suffering. Iannuzzi notes that Luisa's offering "was accompanied by an interior desolation which left her with a feeling of profound spiritual nostalgia for God's presence, constituting at times a true interior martyrdom"[28]. Repairing for the divine lives that creatures refused comes at a cost. The round is therefore not a flight from reality, but an active participation in Christ's reparatory work.
Not an exemption from the sacraments or from the order of the Church
Finally, making the rounds neither replaces nor bypasses sacramental life. The fusion that founds them explicitly includes the "fusion in the order of grace — in all that the Sanctifier, the Holy Spirit, has done and will do." The spirituality of the Divine Will is the full unfolding of the order of grace, never a parallel path. This is why the Church could recognize the doctrinal soundness of Luisa's work, whose writings were submitted to the examination of her censor Saint Annibale Maria di Francia — a point treated in detail in the article the answers to the objections against Luisa Piccarreta's work.
A practice for today
What should be retained, concretely? Making the rounds is not reserved for mystics. Every soul who lives in the Divine Will can, at any moment of the day, "go around" the works of God: give thanks for the rising sun, love God in the sea it beholds, unite itself to the beats of Christ's Heart, offer the Father the acts of all those who do not pray. The round turns a gaze upon the world into an act of universal adoration.
It thus joins the word of Saint Paul, of which the Luisian doctrine is but the profound unfolding: "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me" (Gal 2:20)[29]. In the round, it is no longer only the soul that loves: it is Christ who, in her, gathers the whole of creation to render it to the Father — as Adam did at the origin, "as in triumph."
To go further
- What does fusing oneself in the Divine Will mean? — the act that opens the door of the rounds.
- How to begin the morning prevenient act?
- How to make a current act in the Divine Will?
- What is the gift of living in the Divine Will?
- What is the difference between doing the will of God and living in the Divine Will?
- Why speak of a reign of the Divine Will on earth?
- The Book of Heaven · Luisa Piccarreta · The Divine Will
Notes and References
J. L. Iannuzzi, 70 Questions and Answers on the Spirituality of the Divine Will, Q8 ("What is the difference between the prevenient act, the divine acts and the rounds? Is there a formula for living in the Divine Will?"). Iannuzzi recalls there that God, in breathing life into Adam, made Himself an "actor" (Italian attore) in man and gave power to his "first acts" (primi atti) to be modeled on the acts of God; and he quotes the answer of Saint Annibale Maria di Francia, Luisa's censor: "holiness does not consist in a formula." Iannuzzi is the author of a doctoral thesis in theology defended at the Pontifical Gregorian University (22 November 2012) on the gift of living in the Divine Will.
1 5 6 10 27L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, January 9, 1927 — "I was making my usual round to follow the Divine Will in all Creation." Jesus explains that the soul who operates in His Will forms the equilibrium in all creatures and deposits in each one "the Reign of the Love of My Will, of adoration, of glory, and of all that My Will possesses."
2 23L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 19, September 13, 1926 — Jesus: "This is the reason why I urge you to go around all Our works, Creation and Redemption, so that you may place your 'I love You,' your adoration, your gratitude, your thanks, upon all Our works." The text specifies that the acts of the creature must be sufficient "so that My Reign does not remain suspended in the air, but descends"; there follows Luisa's refrain: "Supreme Majesty, Your little daughter comes to You…"
3 4 22L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 24, June 12, 1928 — "How God feels again the joy of the first days of Creation." Full text: "You make your round in My Will to retrace all its acts, to court them, love them and make them one with yours. When you arrive at Paradise, the joys, the feasts and the happiness experienced by Our Divinity in Creation are renewed. Oh! how seeing you flow into the sun, the wind, the sea and the heavens powerfully reminds Us of the swift flights of the first creature when she came forth from Our creative hands." Master quotation of the article.
7L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 21, March 26, 1927 — "He who possesses the Divine Will recalls all its acts. […] He who does not do the Divine Will is the pilferer of Creation." Luisa: "When I make my round in the supreme Will following all its acts in Creation and Redemption, I have the impression that everything speaks to me."
8L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, October 24, 1926 — Luisa, beginning her round and entering the earthly Eden, where Adam withdrew his will from the Divine Will: "I want to annihilate my will in Yours […] in order to repair Adam's first act and render all glory to Your supreme Will as if Adam had never withdrawn from it."
9L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 16, February 2, 1924 — "Abandonment in God gives wings to fly in the Will." Jesus: "Abandonment gives the wings to be able to fly in My Will. If abandonment ceases, the soul loses its flight and its wings are destroyed." The same passage develops the image of the main wheel and the little wheels, and speaks of the "round of Eternity" in each heartbeat — hence the warning: "if you knew what it means to lose an eternal round!"
11L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, November 1, 1926 — Jesus teaches, station by station, what the Divine Will accomplishes in each work (the heavens, the sun) and how the soul, making its round, must unite itself to that act in order to love and glorify God in each created thing.
12L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, November 1926 — "I was making my round in Creation and, imprinting my 'I love You' upon each created thing, I was asking […] that the Kingdom of the supreme Fiat might come upon the earth." Jesus answers Luisa's objection (created things have no soul): by virtue of the Will that animates them, "created things are all noble queens who belong to My royal family" and have the right to ask for the coming of the Kingdom.
13 14L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 20, November 2, 1926 — Jesus: "Each time you make your round in My Will, you acquire more light to form the net with which I catch creatures. […] It is formed of My knowledges. […] When you make your round in Our Will, by virtue of this Will, your acts become light and extend to touch the Divinity."
15 19L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 12, February 20, 1919 — Jesus: "Souls who live in My Will, as soon as they enter It, find in act all the acts of the Supreme Majesty; and since this Will is in all things and in each one, these souls remain multiplied in all things and are able to offer Me honor, glory, adoration and love for all."
16J. L. Iannuzzi, 70 Questions on the Divine Will, Q11 ("Can someone fuse himself in the Divine Will and raise others as offerings to the Father?"). Iannuzzi writes there: "Luisa often made her rounds in creation, in the one eternal act of God which embraced the thoughts, words and actions of all individuals and creatures of all times […], and offered them to the glory of God. Often, this offering was accompanied by an interior desolation […], constituting at times a true interior martyrdom."
17 28Epistle to the Hebrews 10:14: "By a single offering, he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified." Iannuzzi founds upon this verse the capacity, for the soul who lives in the Divine Will, to share in Christ's unique offering and to offer the Father the acts of all (cf. 70 Questions, Q11).
18L. Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 27, October 30, 1929 — Jesus: "If you want My Divine Will to reign, go always around in Our Fiat, recognize all Our works, from the smallest to the greatest, place your little act in each of them, and all will be granted to you." He adds that recognizing the works of God "is not only a right that We give, but a possession."
20 21Catechism of the Catholic Church, nos. 2822-2827, on the third petition of the Our Father: "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven" (cf. Mt 6:10). Luisa reads this petition as the promise of the establishment of the reign of God's Will on earth, of which the rounds are one of the means.
24L. Piccarreta, 6th Round in the Divine Will (structured corpus of the "Rounds"), cited by J. L. Iannuzzi, 70 Questions, note 40: "I continue my flight in the Divine Will and discover the power of the miracles of Moses, the strength of Samson, the holiness of David, the patience of Job […] and I, imprinting upon them the seal of my 'I love You,' implore in the name of all these figures the reign of Your Kingdom."
25L. Piccarreta, 19th Round in the Divine Will, cited by J. L. Iannuzzi, 70 Questions: "My love, I attach myself to You so as to place my 'I love You' in each of the Sacraments You institute. I join my 'I love You' to the Sacrament of Baptism administered to each soul, and I implore You […] to grant the Divine Fiat to each of those baptized."
26Epistle to the Galatians 2:20: "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me." Cf. also 2 Pet 1:4 (Christians "partakers of the divine nature"), which the Luisian doctrine reads as the participation brought to its term in union with the Will of God.
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