Divine strategy or just human perversity?

Suppose God were working to wean me away from my comfortable academic life and make me ready to jump ship for parish ministry. What would he do?

He'd give me a half-witted department chair who was determined to thwart my promotion. He'd make sure she lied and stalled at every opportunity. And he'd populate the Dean's Office with time-serving non-entities who would rather ignore her lies and prop up her ineffectual leadership than do the right thing by me.

Now suppose everyone involved were simply acting out of ordinary human perversity. What would happen then?

Pretty much the same thing.

Providence is a bitch.