Flos Carmeli

October 15, 2007

The Thorn in the Flesh

Reading Dark Night of the Soul one encounters a passage in which St. John of the Cross gives the fairly traditional view of St. Paul's "thorn in the flesh." During a recent community meeting, one of the community members asked me, "How did he (St. John of the Cross) know that St. Paul's thorn in the flesh was lust? I'd never heard that before."

I responded, perhaps vaguely, but appropriately, "Because he was male." The ambiguity here is which he I was referring to, but it works for both. St. John of the Cross understood because he was male, and the thorn in St. Paul's flesh being lust was perfectly understandable to any other male.

The human male is a very, very simple animal. If two simple needs/desires are satisfied (one of them is food), we tend to be a pretty contented lot. Upset the schedule of one or the other, we tend to get out of sorts.

Yes, it's a vast simplification, but when I think of the capital vices/capital sins and I look at much of human history and human legend, one crops up more often than any other, and it isn't pride. In fact, if one considers the idiotic things done in the name of "love," one can readily conclude that for most men pride takes a far distant second place to lust as the most common besetting sins. For example, Helen of Troy (admittedly legend), the rape of the Sabine women, the reign of Henry VIII, the reign of W J Clinton and role model JFK--the roll call goes on and on.

Judging by the state of society today, it is fairly evident that everything is set to keep that particular vice at a fever pitch. Now, this is not to say that the impulses in this direction cannot be subdued or with the aid of grace resisted. But one glance at the present state of society which, whether feminists like it or not, is a male-construct to which "liberated women" have foolishly consented in their desire to become more and more like men, shows the basis on which almost everything is done, sold, or considered. Again, I'll grant that it is a simplification, but there is an element of truth to it. That element is sometimes expressed in the outrage against celibacy and its native chastity. Some are outraged over the celibacy requirement, calling it unnatural, unrealistic, and gravely disordered. When I look at the same state, I do see something that is not natural--rather it is supernatural--a state exalted above that of most of us and preserved purely by grace. When a priest from time to time fails at maintaining this state of life, that too is likely in God's grace--a lesson in humility, because his fall is a matter of public notice. He cannot do what many in society do casually without causing scandal. But society at large is threatened by it because it is a sign that the thorn in the flesh can be removed or at least made subservient to the person who experiences it. Presently, one would think that the thorn was, in fact, the entire flesh and that such was a normative existence.

St.Anthony of the Desert heroically fought off the demons of lust throughout his time in the desert. St. Augustine, Blessed (?) Charles Foucault, and a great many others, perhaps many we do not know, spent a great deal of energy fighting those impulses that comprised for them "the thorn in the flesh."

In our conversation, I did go on to confide that I honestly didn't know what might form the most common or besetting sin among female kind. (Some women, exhibiting the need and desire to be more like men, have foolishly accepted the male vision of the world and see promiscuous and untethered sexual conduct as normative, rather than as the degrading objectification of persons that it actually is. Sexual congress outside of the sacrament of matrimony is sinful precisely because of its tendency to turn an person into a object. And, in fact, this can be a problem even within the sacramental union.)

Oh, and by the way, I still refuse to speculate. I'll tend my house, thank you, it's far more than I'm capable of on a day-to-day basis anyway.

Now, there is a theory that pride is more an ur-sin rather than a capital sin. That is pride is considered the source of all the other sins.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:58 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

October 6, 2007

The Dark Night of Blessed Mother Teresa

as explicated by St. John of the Cross:

from Dark Night of the Soul I:11:11-12
St. John of the Cross

11. Finally, insofar as these person are purged of their sensory affections and appetites, they obtain freedom of spirit in which they acquire the twelve fruits of the Holy Spirit.

They are also wondrously liberated from the hand of their enemies, the devil, the world, and the flesh. For when the sensory delight delight and gratification regarding things is quenched, neither the devil, nor the world, nor sensuality has arms or power against the spirit.

12. These aridities, then, make people walk with purity in the love of God. No longer are they moved to act by the delight and satisfaction they find in a work, as perhaps they were when the derived this from their deeds, but by the desire of pleasing God. They are neither presumptuous nor self-satisfied, as was their custom int he time of their prosperity, but fearful and disquieted about themselves and lacking in any self-satisfaction. This is the holy fear that preserves and gives increase to the virtues.

I am not original in claiming that the dark night had for Blessed Mother Teresa a protective effect, an effect all the more necessary in a world where the entire world is at your doorstep and scrutinizing every action.

This deep and unsatisfied longing for God's presence has the unique attribute of taking away from her the many temptations that come as a result of success in the world. Satan's most effective ploy in dealing with someone like Mother Teresa would be to have them change their focus from serving and saving souls to better the lives of people. These two sound like hand in glove; however, they are as different in focus as a microscope and a telescope.

What if Mother Teresa, not wandering in a dark night of spirit had started to pay more attention to things that mattered, but were no the One Thing. What if she suddenly started to say to herself, "With a few dollars more, I could build a house for twenty more people." What is the focus of her effort became the betterment of lives through better buildings, more technology, what have you, rather than helping people to get what they needed to live a life and leave a life with dignity. No matter how holy the motive, when the focus slips from, "For God and God alone, a gift of His people," to "Look what we can do if we only try," Satan has won.

But the dark night has a paradoxical effect. The longing for and the apparent absence of God in a life, increases the focus on serving Him. It cocoons the person away from some of the yammerings of the world and helps them to see life as it should be seen.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 2:48 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 16, 2007

Sayings of Light and Love

45. Blessed are they who, setting aside their own pleasure and inclination, consider things according to reason and justice before doing them.

57. It is not God's will that a soul be disturbed by anything or suffer trials, for if one suffers trials in the adversities of the world it is because of a weakness in virtue. The perfect soul rejoices in what afflicts the imperfect one.

73. What does it profit you to give God one thing if he asks of you another? Consider what it is God wants, and then do it. You will as a result satisfy your heart better than with something toward which you yourself are inclined. (for kobj, particularly)

137. To lose always and let everyone else win is a trait of valiant souls, generous spirits, and unselfish hearts; it is their manner to give rather than receive even to the extent of giving themselves. They consider it a heavy burden to possess themselves, and it pleases them more to be possessed by others and withdrawn from themselves, since we belong more to that infinite Good than we do to ourselves.

147. Never listen to talk about the weaknesses of others, and if someone complains of another, you can tell her humbly to say nothing of it to you

From the translaiton by Fr. Kiernan Kavanaugh and Otilio Rodriguez.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 10:26 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 30, 2007

Insight from Brian Moore

For a lapsed Catholic, Brian Moore has a good deal to tell those of us who remain staunchly within the confines of the Church:

from Cold Heaven
Brian Moore

"I don't believe in God. I am your opposite," Marie said. "Happiness, for me, is knowing that I am in charge of my own life, that I can do as I choose. Don't you see that you're a victim, as I am a victim? What sort of love is it that's withdrawn from someone as good as you, sending you into despair? What sort of love could I possibly feel for a force which has done these things to me and to my husband?"

The room was still. The question hung in the air. Then Mother St. Jude said, "I know nothing of God's intentions. But I can tell you what St. John of the Cross has written. 'I am not made or unmade by the things which happen to me but by my reaction to them. That is all God cares about.' Do you understand, Marie?"

"No," Marie said. "No, I don't."

The old nun took Marie's hand in hers. "If Reverend Mother orders me to do something, I do it, not because I want to, or because I think it is right. I do it because she represents Christ in our community. It is Christ who commands me. St. John tells us that to do things because you want to do them or because you think they are right are simply human considerations. He tells us that obedience influenced by human considerations is almost worthless in the eyes of God. I obey--always--because God commands me." She smiled. "So I am not a victim, Marie. . . ."

In the matter of Church teaching is this our first thought? I have received a word from the Vicar of Christ on Earth--his word requires special consideration for me because it is God speaking through him. Now, it is always possible that in prudential matters a fallible human has misjudged and so might be wrong. However, I find it more likely that one who is truly seeking to follow God is more likely to be attuned to His Will even in prudential matters. That is, one who spends much time with God seems a more trustworthy guide than one who spends very little time.

However, I often see critiques of encyclicals and teachings that seem more designed to deconstruct them and make them a matter of personal preference rather than a matter for obedience. I will admit (again) that I rant and rave, but I take a certain amount of comfort from the parable in which Jesus asks which son has done the Father's will--the one who says yes and stays at home in comfort and leisure, or the one who says no, but goes out to work the fields as his Father requested. I may rant and rave, but by God's will, I am eventually able to say yes and enter those fields once again.

Accepting another's will is not easy, particularly when we've become overly used to "things as they are." But like that mysterious blue guitar of Wallace Stevens, "Things as they are are changed" when the vicar of Christ or those who wield legitimate authority over us in the spiritual realm promulgate a teaching. It is our duty and responsibility to understand a teaching from the magisterium and to the extent possible incorporate that understanding into our own way of living out the Christian vocation. And, there is a certain comfort in knowing that God has laid a special responsibility on the shoulders of those who watch over us:

Ezekiel 33:2-6, KJV

Son of man, speak to the children of thy people, and say unto them, When I bring the sword upon a land, if the people of the land take a man of their coasts, and set him for their watchman:

If when he seeth the sword come upon the land, he blow the trumpet, and warn the people;

Then whosoever heareth the sound of the trumpet, and taketh not warning; if the sword come, and take him away, his blood shall be upon his own head.

He heard the sound of the trumpet, and took not warning; his blood shall be upon him. But he that taketh warning shall deliver his soul.

But if the watchman see the sword come, and blow not the trumpet, and the people be not warned; if the sword come, and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at the watchman's hand.

If the watchman sees evil and does not identify it and people fall because of it, they fall because of iniquity, but the fault lies with the watchman. However, if he does see and reports it and we choose to ignore what he has reported, then we fail of ourselves, and he is considered innocent.

The shepherds of souls have enormous responsibilities before God. And I have no doubt that this responsibility is always made manifest. Therefore, it is not in their best interest to issue ill-conceived, inappropriate, or miscalculated teachings in the matter of faith and morals. The teachings may be insufficient at times--perhaps unclear. But knowing the terrible responsibility of the shepherding of souls, and knowing that they will account for all those they have lost, I see that the teaching of the Church is to be trusted as a faithful guide. While I may not always understand why the truth is as it is, I know that I can trust it because my obedience is to those in legitimate authority. They speak with God's voice.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:31 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

December 14, 2006

One Last Word from St. John of the Cross

For those who wish to know the "intimate" St. John of the Cross, you probably could do no better than to read the very brief, but very rich "Sayings of Light and Love" from which the quotation below is extracted.

16. O sweetest love of God, so little known, whoever has found this rich mine is at rest!

Where your heart is, there is your treasure. Where your treasure is, so you will find your heart. I can think of no greater treasure than the love of God, and yet my heart dwells there so infrequently.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 2:20 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

More from St. John of the Cross

From "Sayings of Light and Love"

13. God desires the least degree of obedience and submissiveness more than all those services you think of rendering him.

Too often I want to "do things for God," when, in fact, what God requires and desires is that I simply listen to Him and obey Him.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 2:15 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

The World and God's Love

from Sayings of Light and Love
St. John of the Cross

The Lord has always revealed to mortals the treasures of his wisdom and his spirit, but now that the face of evil bares itself more and more, so does the Lord bare his treasures more.

On the community of believers:

Source as noted above

7. The virtuous soul that is alone and without a master is like a lone burning coal; it will grow colder rather than hotter.
8. Those who fall alone remain alone in their fall, and they value their soul little since they entrust it to themselves alone.
9. If you do not fear falling alone, do you presume that you will rise up alone? Consider how much more can be accomplished by two together than by one alone.

Although originally written for cloistered nuns, I think the truth of these statements resonates for every Catholic.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:42 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 5, 2006

On Spiritual Gluttony

Being a Carmelite can be difficult. Heck, let's face it, it is difficult. The dedication to a life of prayer is all well and good, but it is ethereal and a matter of grace overcoming the tendency one might have to seek more sensible satisfaction.

from Dark Night of the Soul Book 1 Chapter 6
St. John of the Cross

[On Spiritual Gluttony]

2. Such individuals are unreasonable and most imperfect. They subordinate submissiveness and obedience (which is a penance of reason and discretion, and consequently a sacrifice more pleasing and acceptable to God) to corporeal penance. But corporeal penance without obedience is no more than a penance of beasts. And like beasts, they are motivated in these penances by an appetite for the pleasure they find in them. Since all extremes are vicious and since by such behavior these persons are doing their own will, they grow in vice rather than in virtue. For through this conduct they at least become spiritually gluttonous and proud, since they do not tread the path of obedience. The devil, increasing the delights and appetites of these beginners and thereby stirring up this gluttony in them, so impels many of them that when they are unable to avoid obedience they either add to, change, or modify what was commanded. Any obedience in this matter is distasteful to them. Some reach such a point that the mere obligation of obedience to perform their spiritual exercises makes them lose all desire and devotion. Their only yearning and satisfaction is to do what they feel inclined to do, whereas it would be better in all likelihood for them not to do this at all.

3. Some are very insistent that their spiritual director allow them to do what they themselves want to do, and finally almost force the permission from him. And if they do not get what they want, they become sad and go about like testy children. They are under the impression that they do not serve God when they are not allowed to do what they want. Since they take gratification and their own will as their support and their god, they become sad, weak, and discouraged when their director takes these from them and desires that they do God's will. They think that gratifying and satisfying themselves is serving and satisfying God. . . .

6. They have the same defect in their prayer, for they think the whole matter of prayer consists in looking for sensory satisfaction and devotion. They strive to procure this by their own efforts, and tire and weary their heads and their faculties. When they do not get this sensible comfort, they become very disconsolate and think they have done nothing. Because of their aim they lose true devotion and spirit, which lie in distrust of self and in humble and patient perseverance so as to please God. Once they do not find delight in prayer, or in any other spiritual exercise, they feel extreme reluctance and repugnance in returning to it and sometimes even give it up. For after all, as was mentioned,1 they are like children who are prompted to act not by reason but by pleasure. All their time is spent looking for satisfaction and spiritual consolation; they can never read enough spiritual books, and one minute they are meditating on one subject and the next on another, always hunting for some gratification in the things of God. God very rightly and discreetly and lovingly denies this satisfaction to these beginners. If he did not, they would fall into innumerable evils because of their spiritual gluttony and craving for sweetness. This is why it is important for these beginners to enter the dark night and be purged of this childishness.2

Perhaps everyone longs for some surety of the effectiveness of communication; looks for some sign that the message has been received and acknowledged; looks for some hint that love sent out is returned.

In the matter of prayer, such longings are not to be trusted. In fact, in the matter of prayer, such longings are a temptation away from prayer. If one enters prayer with the notion that one needs to "get something out of it," one will fail every time because there will come a time when nothing sensible does come out of it.

But there are several reasons why this attitude is wrong. If someone were invited to a friend's house for a quiet cup of tea (coffee) and a sit out on the back porch watching the world go by, most would not immediately ask, "What will I get out of it?" This simply isn't the way most people look at friendship. Time is spent because it is profitable, in ways untold, to spend the time. If one's fiancé said, "Let's go for a walk" most people would not ask, "What can I expect from it? Will I know that you love me more by the end of it?" Why then, when it comes to prayer, are expectations so different? In prayer, one is invited to spend time with the Bridegroom of the Soul, the closest, most intimate friend anyone will ever have. But the attitude many, if not most, strike is, "Show me how this will be good for me."

Or think of the matter in another way. When one has been spending a great deal of time in physical training, one doesn't enter the weight room with the expectation that there will be any sensible difference by the time one leaves. In fact, if one is wise, one doesn't really desire any sensible difference because the difference one is more likely than not to sense will be pain. So with prayer, the constant practice of which is remotely analogous to weight-training, one does it to maintain one's grace-won place in the Kingdom, not to "be promoted" to Sainthood. The purpose of prayer is not to earn a place at the right hand of God, but to remain in the place that God's grace has fashioned for one. That, in itself, is the life of heroic sanctity--to advance in holiness, to advance in being what God would have one be, to weed out all imperfection from life and to move as God would have one move. These are achieved not through the sensible satisfactions of prayer, but through simple and humble obedience, humility, and gratitude. One advances not by advancing, but by remaining precisely where God would have one be and not questioning one's station but accepting the will of God in the matter of one's place in the kingdom.

Spiritual Gluttony, the desire to sniff out the sensible consolations of prayer and focus on them, stands in the way of accepting God's will. It amounts to saying, "So long as you do what I like, I shall visit. But as soon as you stop paying out the wealth of your generosity, I shall seek other venues for satisfaction." The desire for sensation overpowers the desire to serve and to be with Our Lord to the detriment of each person who succumbs and of all the people that surround them. Prayer is not about sensible consolation, but about obedience, humility, gratitude, and joy in the presence of an intimate friend.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:40 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

May 1, 2006

T.S.Eliot's Riff on St. John of the Cross

from Four Quartets: "East Coker" III
T.S. Eliot

You say I am repeating
Something I have said before. I shall say it again.
Shall I say it again? In order to arrive there,
To arrive where you are, to get from where you are not,
You must go by a way wherein there is no ecstasy.
In order to arrive at what you do not know
You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance.
In order to possess what you do not possess
You must go by the way of dispossession.
In order to arrive at what you are not
You must go through the way in which you are not.
And what you do not know is the only thing you know
And what you own is what you do not own
And where you are is where you are not.

from Ascent of Mount Carmel I.13.11

St. John of the Cross

To reach satisfaction in all
Desire its possession in nothing,
To come to the knowledge of all
Desire the knowledge of nothing.
To come to possess all
Desire the possession of nothing.
To arrive at being all
Desire to be nothing.
To come to the pleasure you have not
You must go by a way in which you enjoy not.
To come to the knowledge you have not
You must go by a way in which you know not.
To come to the possession you have not
You must go by a way in which you possess not.
To come to be what you are not
You must go by a way in which you are not.
When you turn toward something
You cease to cast yourself upon the all,
For to go from the all to the all
You must possess it without wanting anything.
In this nakedness the spirit finds its rest,
for when it covets nothing
nothing raises it up and nothing weighs it down,
because it stands in the centre of its humility.

In the third division of East Coker, T.S. Eliot embarks upon the journey into dark. At first this journey is equated with death, "O dark, dark, dark. They all go into the dark," is the first line of the section. He then goes through a litany of who "they all" are and the fact that they all go into the dark. He seems to make the point that the dark comes upon everyone whether or not they are prepared to enter it. Then, at the end of the section, Eliot segues to a different dark, another kind of death--the death, while yet willing, of the self and selfishness, which can only proceed along the dark way, the via negativa the "dark night of the soul." It is a dark night because cherished false images of self must die in the light of God Himself. Indeed, the light of God Himself is so light that it appear dark to those ill-equipped to receive it.

Death to self is not death of self. To travel to God in this life, one must die to self, to selfishness, to self-involvement, to all the illusions and images of oneself that have become so cherished. One must consent to being stripped down to the barest nothingness and reconstructed in God's image. This is terrifying, at least in the abstract. But when one stops to consider that nearly everyone experiences this to one degree or another without tremendous instantaneous repercussions, it becomes less terrifying and more inviting. Children are taught by the parents from very early on not to be selfish and self centered. They are constantly reminded "please, thank you, excuse me." They are constantly told, although not in so many words, to die to self.

When a person behaves in "conventional" ways, following the rules of courtesy or etiquette, that person dies to self a little. It isn't a major, earth-shaking trauma, but a small turning away from serving oneself and toward serving another. When one gives place, willingly or unwillingly to another, one dies to self--sometimes reluctantly and bitterly, engendering rage and a desire for vengeance. Sometimes willingly, engendering love and charity.

The death to self must be complete to continue on the path to God. These many small things add up, but each person is asked for more. Each person is asked, in fact, for everything. But most of the time they are not asked for every at once. It is a slow growth, a gentle path, as yet winding through the foothills that lead up to Mount Carmel. The steep ascent is another matter entirely, and there must be a certain amount of shedding of self that occurs before one can set foot on the mountain proper.

But everyone is called, and in this life or the next, all will Ascend through the darkness of the weight of self into the light of the Father. This is what purgatory and heaven are all about--shedding self to become God while remaining distinctly who one is in Him. Salvation--to be who one is without shame; to shine always with His light. But the path of salvation is dark because people tend to love themselves almost to the exclusion of everything else. So it is through darkness that we arrive at light, although as we travel, God's light is all around--so brilliant one calls it darkness.

Later: One is lead to wonder as well whether the first lines of this section of East Coker are not meant to hearken back to a previous poet. Tennyson seems to be referred to, particularly with reference to this poem:

Break, Break, Break

Break, break, break
On thy cold grey stones, O Sea!
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.

O well for the fisherman's boy,
That he shouts with his sister at play!
O well for the sailor lad,
That he sings in his boat on the bay!

And the stately ships go on
To their haven under the hill;
But O for the touch of a vanished hand,
And the sound of a voice that is still!

Break, break, break
At the foot of thy crags, O Sea!
But the tender grace of a day that is dead
Will never come back to me.

But following the rule of three, one would have to find other correspondences before anything so bold could be asserted. Notes for a future consideration of the two.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 10:30 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 6, 2006

The Road of the Cross--A Consolation

Here's a thought that I am only beginning to come to terms with:

from The Way of the Cross with the Carmelite Saints: St. John of the Cross

On this [narrow] road there is room only for self-denial (as our Savior asserts) and the cross. The cross is a supporting staff that greatly lightens and eases the journey.

I have a few minor problems with the first part. Mostly they are problems of proportionality and my role. I must deny myself, but in denying myself, I may not deny others. For example, I may give up a great many things, but I cannot impose upon my wife and child to give up those same things. I can encourage and I can lead by example, but an imposition from without is not self-denial but simply oppression.

Self-denial may be difficult, but I at least understand it. I'm only beginning to sense the truth encompassed in the second sentence, and I probably won't be able to make much sense of it to you, but here I go anyway.

When you love deeply, everything you do in love is made easier by being in love. Self-denial isn't self-denial, it is making a gift of yourself. You want the best of everything for the person you love and you're willing to see to it that they get it. You deny yourself some small trinket or even something necessary in order to fulfill the need you perceive. When your love is Jesus Christ, taking up your cross is part of His being able to bear His. We all participate in being Simon the Cyrene when we choose to carry our cross and deal with the burdens of the world at large. In this sense the cross becomes a staff. It is something we have taken up in love, not in thinking about ourselves, but in thinking about Jesus.

True self-denial denies even the concept of self-denial. It cannot be self-denial if it is given in love. Yes, you are incidentally denied something, but that something you are denied contributes to the welfare of another, if only in the spiritual realm. Self-denial does not always see the denial, it sees only the end for which the denial occurs--Jesus Christ. Thus, taking up the cross becomes not so much a chore as an exertion of love--a sign of our Love for the savior. Indeed, when love carries the burden, it works so strongly that it lifts us up as well.

Do what you do not for fear of hell or hope of heaven, but for the love of Jesus Christ. When that motivates all that we are and all that we do, the world itself is transformed, and what appear to be heroic acts of virtue are baubles, trifles, never enough to satisfy our desire to give. We suffer with the suffering of being unable to give enough, of being mortal and confined and limited. Our suffering greatly increases as our love increases and I wonder if even the suffering is not suffering, but it is part of the transformative union that allows us to share the aloneness of Jesus on the Cross for a single moment. If for an instant I could be with Him when He was most abandoned, what a consolation that would be to the entire world. If I could enter into that dark and terrifying place and say, "I'm here Lord," what a consolation that would be. Suffering would still be suffering, but it would be transformed in Him.

I go on too long. I am only beginning to understand, and my lack of understanding makes many words of what is probably a very simple thing. But it is a thing I need to know better and embrace more completely. Self-denial is meaningless if all I ever look at is my self and what is being denied. Self-denial seeks to look beyond the mere temporal object to the final Glory for which we have surrendered the object so important to us.

What a joyful, wonderful time Lent is. I want to say to all the world, "Come on in, the water's fine. And the company is just grand."

Posted by Steven Riddle at 12:28 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Paradoxes of Faith

from The Way of the Cross with the Carmelite Saints: St. John of the Cross

[W]ho seeks not the cross of Christ seeks not the glory of Christ.

Christ's cross is His Glory. The resurrection, which affirms the triumph of the Cross is also glorious and joyful, but the act in which the separation of humankind from the intimacy of God was accomplished was the death on the Cross. If we seek to avoid the Cross, if we avert our eyes from it, we are averting our eyes from His glory, His great triumph. On the Cross He reunited God and His children. In the great Alone of His suffering, He forged the unbreakable covenant of our Salvation.

Honestly, I can't begin to understand it. I can't begin to tell what it means. But the words echo in my mind and the reality thrills my spirit as few things have done. What a gracious, loving, merciful, welcoming God we have. Isn't it time for all of us to stop rebelling and return home?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 12:06 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

God Spoke One Word

Twice during my retreat I encountered this phrase from "The Sayings of Light and Love" of St. John of the Cross.

"God spoke one word."

I knew immediately the meaning, but it took a while for the implications to sink in. If God spoke only one Word, what are all those words in the Bible about? Yes, I know I'm slow, but obviously, every one of them is about Jesus Christ. How? Until I meditate on every one of them I cannot tell you. Truthfully even afterwards, I suspect that I will not understand the full mystery of it. Nevertheless, I know that it is true.

To give you an example, in this morning's Office of readings:

"Therefore, say to the Israelites: I am the Lord. I will free you from the forced labor of the Egyptians and will deliver you from their slavery. I will rescue you by my outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment."

There's more, but let's stop there.

What I heard as I read this substituted the words "your sins" for "the Egyptians."

" I am the Lord. I will free you from the forced labor of your sins and will deliver you from their slavery."

How will he do this? "I will rescue you by my outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment." Arms outstretched on a cross--the mighty acts of judgment, those which condemned the savior and brought Him to the cross, but also those that occurred after His death, in which the veil in the temple was torn in two, breaking the barrier between the Holy Spirit of God and His people.

This is an anticipatory reading of the passage. That is to say, it is reading into the passage and not the literal meaning. The literal meaning must be preserved, but the language used eerily forecasts the kind of redemption we were to receive.

Rolling this all into a ball and sending it spinning across the field, we come back to "God spoke one Word."

Praise the Lord!

Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:01 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

March 1, 2006

Words for Lent

"Whoever seeks God while wanting to hold on to his own likes and dislikes, may seek Him day and night, but will never find Him."

St. John of the Cross The Spiritual Canticle

Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:34 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 9, 2006

REALLY Hard Instructions

from Listen to the Silence: A Retreat With Pere Jacques
Tr./Ed. Francis J. Murphy

Then, between them, with a quick stroke, he drew what must be the way of our retreat; a direct, exacting road on which one hears the refrain, "Nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing but God alone." Not this little personal matter, not this slight comfort we cling to, not this tiny curiosity that seems so trivial, but "nothing, absolutely nothing"--John of the Cross is speaking. You see, this retreat we are making must have direction. When Saint Bernard arrive at the monastery he too asked himself frequently, "Bernard, what did you come to the monastery to do?"

I hear the call of nothing--attachment to nothing, cleaving to nothing, being nothing. And my heart wants to follow it, but my body has ideas of its own. And my reason, tricky little devil that it is says things like, "Well the joy you take in this or that minor pleasure is eutrepalia legitimate, and legitimate use of God's goods.

But I've come to the point where I must say, "No, it isn't." And I need to leave behind the things that attract me and keep me away from the serious pursuit of the one thing that matters. I need to discipline myself so that nothing ever interferes with Everything.

And you know, the thought isn't chilling, frightening, or even daunting. It is enthralling. It is the most exciting thing in the world. So, why is it I never make it beyond the first few steps?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:14 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

December 14, 2005

A Feast/A Fast--St. John of the Cross

I'll probably not post much today as this is one of the most important Feast Days in the Carmelite calendar for me personally. And it's odd, would St. John of the Cross wish us to remember him with a Feast or a Fast? I'd rather think the latter, but the Church in her wisdom declares a cessation to the Advential (and traditionally post Triumph of the Holy Cross) Fast that marks the season. Who am I to disagree?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 11:52 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

November 21, 2005

The Joy of La Madre/Praying Constantly

The more I read about Teresa of Avila, the more she becomes my mother. I am a person after her heart, or at least I'm in training, trying to learn to be.

The other day I quoted some swathes of St. Teresa. Now I shall regale you with other related pieces:

from Journey to Carith
Peter-Thomas Rohrbach

[first a repeat]

"My chief fear," she wrote, "is that the sisters should lose the spirit of joy by which the Lord leads them, for I know what a discontented nun is."

In this he [Nicholas Doria--the autocratic first Prior General of the Discalced Carmelites] was diametrically opposed to the mentality of Teresa who wrote: "What my nuns are afraid of is that we shall get some tiresome superiors who will lay heavy and excessive burdens on them. That will lead us nowhere." And when a visitator had written a number of directives for her nuns, she wrote: "Even reading the regulations made me tired, so what would it be if one had to keep them? Believe me, our rule will not stand additions from tiresome people like that: it is quite hard enough to keep as it is." Doria certainly fell into her category of "tiresome people."

This Saint who begged to be delivered from "sour-faced Saints" (one gets the impression that she wouldn't much have cared for Jerome or Margaret-Mary Alacoque) understood the primary place of Joy in being able to follow God.

Joy is not merely the result of following Him, it is the consolation poured out for obedience to Him, which, in turn, makes following Him easier and more desirable. In the Teresian reform and constitutions, there is the perfect blend of joy and discipline. The discipline, in fact, is a source of joy. It is a boundary that helps define the acceptable limits of behavior and the expectations of one who dearly loves the Lord.

We do not have to practice endless self-denying things. It is enough to take ten or fifteen minutes and spend it in prayer. Not in petitions, or intercessions, or any sort of planned, pre-considered prayer, but rather in the conversation with the Lord that results from considering His word to us. Fifteen minutes of Lectio each day is discipline enough. At least for Carmelites, at least as a start. As one is faithful to the time, the desire to increase the time grows dramatically. Fifteen minutes becomes insufficient. But the press of the day will not allow more! It's amazing what the Lord will work when we give Him the opportunity. I did not have enough time for prayer in recent weeks and so I've been visited by a condition that frequently causes me to wake in the night and need to get up and move about for a while. Surprisingly, I do not feel less rested in the morning for all the break in the middle of the night. And what is the thing I do? I pray. Yes, I also write and read and do other things, but I pray in ways that were not possible in the course of the day. If the desire is there, God will find a way to help! It won't always be the same way--but I'm stubborn to the core and have to be convinced to take time out, so the Lord used this means. For others, they will find windows of time mysteriously opening up that somehow never really affect the other tasks of the day.

The simple practice of time alone with God allows us to carry the God of our acquaintance in solitude into ordinary life. We have what St. John of the Cross refers to as "solitude of the heart" and it makes it possible to pray constantly. Elsewhere in the book referenced above is this intriguing reference:

One of his contemporaries recalls that John would frequently scrape his knuckles against the wall while he was conversing with others so that he could keep his attention on the matter at hand and not allow himself to become rapt in prayer.

Oh what a gift--to have to distract myself to keep me OUT of prayer. But that is the gift and consolation incumbent upon solitude of the heart, which is cultivated by the little discipline of daily solitude with God. What perfect joy--to have to distract myself from prayer. I only hope that this longing within me increases immeasurably until it overwhelms all other conflicting desires.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 10:30 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

October 31, 2005

Distractions in Prayer

Distraction may be the chief complaint levied about one’s prayer life. Regarding distraction, here is something from the two leading teachers of prayer in the Carmelite tradition.

from Carmelite Prayer: A Tradition for the 21st Century
Ed. Fr. Keith J. Egan

“Contemplation and the Stream of Consciousness�
by Fr. Kiernan Kavanaugh

With little difficulty we can recognize the similarities between Teresa’s teaching on prayer and contemplation and John’s. Both admit to an activity on our own part, especially at the beginning, an activity of reading, thinking, and recollection. Both direct this activity to the loving knowledge of, or presence to, or relationship with Christ. In both, we find descriptions of the prayer of recollection active and passive, of quiet, and of union. Both admit that the wandering mind or imagination is an accompaniment to prayer and contemplation.

In fact, after a lifetime of distraction and pain from distraction St.Teresa finally has this advice to offer:

from “ Jesus Christ in Carmelite Prayer�
by Sr. Mary Dorgan

“Taking it upon oneself to stop and suspend thought is what I mean should not be done. . . . “ She tells us that in regard to “. . . this effort to suspend the intellect . . . labor will be wasted. . . “(BL. 12.5). She warns against a kind of mental coercion to empty ourselves of thoughts in order to achieve a held absorption. St Teresa was too familiar with this experience in herself and in others, based on a too-demanding cut-down of outside stimuli, that could lead to quietism. “To be always withdrawn for corporeal things. . . is the trait of angelic spirits, not of those who live in mortal bodies. . . . How much more is it necessary not to withdraw through one’s own efforts from all our good and help with is the most sacred humanity of our Lord Jesus Christ� (IC 6.7.6).

For Teresa and for John as well, this constant babble of wayward thoughts is part and parcel of who we are. To deny it is to deny who we are. I would go further to say that this constant stream of thought defines, in a special way, who we are. More than that, this constant stream of thought forms the ostinato against which the melody of prayer plays out. That is to say, that these very real, very present concerns are a real part of prayer. When they invade, they do so out of two causes—one is that we are insufficiently focused on our goal—thus they serve as the watchdogs of prayer. The other is that they are real and present concerns that define in part where we are in our day and in our lives. To deny them is, in a way, denying access to a real and important part of ourselves to the dearest friend we have. It would be rather like chatting about the weather to our best friend just prior to the time we are going to enter the hospital to have some serious medical tests. We haven’t told our best friend and we are screening out that concern. Only it is worse because our friend already knows about these concerns because He lives within and sees them flitting about batting their wings against the cages we try to make for them.

What then to do about distractions? Accept them. Don’t welcome them, but accept them, and turn back to the conversation. Think about a conversation on your front porch on a fine spring say as your children are running on the lawn and playing. If your children are normal they are up on that porch at least as much as they are kicking a ball or playing catch or hide-and-seek. However, it is a fine day, your friend as much as you enjoys the sounds and sights and presence of the children, and when they break into the conversation, He doesn’t regard them with exasperation, but with the loving, doting look of one who has sat many a time watching them play. When the concerns of the children are finished, the matter of a moment or two, we return to the conversation.

That is the important point—we may be dragged off-course, but always return, gently, lovingly, longingly, to the conversation.

On a personal note—I have often been battered by distractions. Until recently they would completely derail my efforts at any sort of coherent conversation. And then, suddenly, as in a coup de grace, they became integrated into my prayer, they would appear and drop away and I would not worry myself about their intrusion, but, as in contemplating the mysteries of the Rosary, I would allow them to sound and then gently fall back below the surface. They continued throughout the prayer, but the prayer continued as well. No, I didn’t achieve transports of union—but then I’m not there at this point. I am still learning to talk and to listen and to offer who I am and what I am concerned about.

So my advice for those distracted in prayer—don’t focus on the distraction, focus on the person with Whom you are conversing. He knows what is playing through your brain. He knows who and what you are, and He is patient and welcoming to all of you—distraction, intentions, and conversation. Don’t worry about it. Prayer will not be perfectly quiet until it is time for it—and then the Lord will lead. Otherwise, don’t fret. Through her entire life, St. Teresa of Avila was plagued with distraction, and yet she is no less a saint for all of that.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:29 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack

October 12, 2005

Continuing on a Previous Point

Ascent of Mount Carmel (iv.ii)

This is how John defines a "beginner" in prayer.

3. And this first night pertains to beginners, occurring at the time when God begins to bring them into the state of contemplation; in this night the spirit likewise has a part, as we shall say in due course. And the second night, or purification, pertains to those who are already proficient, occurring at the time when God desires to bring them to the state of union with God. And this latter night is a more obscure and dark and terrible purgation, as we shall say afterwards. (Ascent I.I.3)

Posted by Steven Riddle at 2:03 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 3, 2005

Approaching Lent--Deciding What We Want

I trouble you once again with insights from Sr. Ruth Burrows.

from Ascent to Love
Sr. Ruth Burrows

We have one dynamism of choice. That dynamism must be controlled, concentrated, otherwise it ceases to be dynamic and is like a worn out battery driving nothing. If we do not know what we really want, if we vacillate, allowing ourselves to be drawn hither and thither, we become enfeebled and our faculty of choice is weakened. We must decide what we really want and concentrate on that. 'The soul whose will is torn between trifles is like water which n ever rises because it is running through an outlet down below.'

Taking a lesson from Aquinas--God is uniate, simple. There is no part of Him that is not integrated with all other parts (in as much as He can be said to have "parts"). This is a very hard lesson. We know the truth of the shema Y'israel--"Know O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is One." We know this. But the doctrine of the trinity sometimes clouds our understanding no matter how clearly we state it. Nevertheless, we know it to be true--God is triUNE--three person in union--simple. God is one. Uniate. Simple.

Why make such a big deal about it? Well, if God is uniate, simple, one, then nothing that is not God can be part of Him. That is, until our complete purification either here or in purgatory, we cannot join the God who is One. There can be no union of like with unlike. There is no mystical marriage and the fullness of the beatific vision is impossible. God is One and immovable, we are duple (at least) and duplicitous and must become simple and one to move toward the One.

This is what Sr. Ruth is emphasizing here. Our desire must be one, our heart must be one, our minds must be one, our intent must be one, our actions must be one. We cannot look now at God and now at some created good. Our choice must be singly and wholeheartedly one.

Now, there is not a little fear in this choice. What will happen to my family if my whole attention is devoted to God, to my career, to my life, to my leisure? What will happen to me?

What ideally SHOULD happen if one makes this choice is that "me" drops out of the picture and our joy and delight ever increases in serving God. It is in selflessness that we find the truest definition of self. If all of our being is aligned in wanting the One thing that matters, then we will not be troubled by the old car in the driveway or by wanting filet and eating chicken. We will not be disturbed by the same currents that scatter the rest of the school. We will begin to see eternity and what is present will pass away in RELATIVE importance. That does not mean our family passes out of our mind, but rather in the selflessness we practice we more completely serve our families and those around us. Union with the One does not mean the abandonment of life on Earth, but complete joy in that life and complete service to His ends in it.

The reality is very simple--we can continue to live a life in tension--in a kind of dynamic opposition of created good and Creator. Or we can "Choose Life" as we are commanded:

Deuteronomy 30:19-20

"I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse; therefore choose life, that you and your descendants may live, loving the LORD your God, obeying his voice, and cleaving to him; for that means life to you and length of days, that you may dwell in the land which the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them."

"Cleave to Him." the ancient language used to describe the relationship of marriage where "the two become one." In fact, throughout the Bible we are called to this surrender of marriage, this abandonment of self and immersion in the self as defined by God's vision of us. Cleaving to God is a vision of divine union that promises "length of days." Not length of life, but the "length", if you will, of eternity.

So today and all the days I chance to think about it and particularly through this season of Lent, I must make a constant choice to "Choose life" so that I might begin to live rather than to walk through life. We have but one chance to get it right, but within that chance so many opportunities. "This is the day the Lord has made, let us be glad and rejoice in Him!"

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:56 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 20, 2005

Bearing with Other's as God's Will for Us

On nearly every page of Sr. Ruth's book there is something worthy of quotation. Were I to follow my inclination, I would end up retyping the entire book. As it stands, I'm already presenting too much--but there is a wealth of wisdom and richness in what she has to say. And she has a very deft hand at sifting out what is essential and what is optional in the teaching of St. John of the Cross. I don't know that I agree with all of her conclusions, but there is more than enough agreement to make the book helpful to me. That said, this Theresian interpolation of St. John of the Cross through Sr. Ruth is very, very nice indeed.

from Ascent to Love
Ruth Burrows

This making ourselves of little account in a practical way will greatly affect our relationships with others. . . . Nothing so reduces the ego as the realities of living with others and not demanding that they change so as to suit ourselves. . . . God brings people into community precisely in order to purify them as gold is purified with fire and the hammer. . . .

What an enormous difference attitudes make. We shall have to bear many difficulties from other people anyway. To see in all these things God's will for our ascent to him and to make up our minds to adopt a positive attitude makes everything so much easier! John's asceticism taken at one swallow can seem just too much, but lived out it can only be happiness-giving. We are our own misery and affliction. Get rid of the ego and we are truly happy and at peace.

There is so much solid and clear wisdom here. Unless you are a hermit, you will live your life among other people. Living your life in this way means that you will encounter people and aspects of people that you find wearying, annoying, irritating, nauseating, and otherwise personally unacceptable. Our usual tactic in such a situation, if we cannot remove ourselves from the person involved, is to seek to change the person. How many husbands and wives carry on a kind of sparring match over issues like who takes the trash out, whether the toilet seat is down or up, who dumps their clothes where, etc. etc. There are endless irritating and aggravating proclivities in the entire world that is not ME. And if the truth be told, if the world were more like ME, I suspect I would find it all the more annoying.

When we stop trying to change the world and we accept what comes to us from God's hands, that is when the world really is changed. It is changed in that I am changed, and it is changed in that my perception of it has become more Godly. I will not convert my wife by lecturing at her, I may not even convert her by following Sr. Ruth's advice, but I will have converted myself so that rather than being aggravated and constantly looking for my own fulfillment, I am looking in the aggravating situation for a way to show my love to God by loving my wife. And the best way is to accept what comes from His hand as the will for the moment and to rejoice in the attention He is paying me and the path that is being paved to allow my ascent.

In every case, when we can put self aside, we will be serving God. And when we do so we immediately become better witnesses for Him. Our strongest Catholic witness is not necessarily a lecture about the Real Presence or the apostolic succession (true though they may be) but rather our joy in living out our Catholic Faith. Was it St. Teresa who said, "Lord preserve me from sour-faced saints?" Knowing God is real joy, profound joy, life affecting joy. Too often we are caught up in our own agendas, attempting to shape all things to ourselves and to our own convenience to notice that these little miseries, these little hardships are training us up in the way we should go--in enduring them is far greater joy than can ever be had by tryng to put them aside or change them. God is a loving Father and everything He sends, He sends for our good. Problem is, we don't really believe that--we think we can take this good and make it better. The reality is living what God has given us is our highest good.

So, as we will have to deal with people who do not precisely conform to what we think they should be or do, we do best to endure cheerfully and in fact with great humility and love. For by so doing we will be heaping burning coals upon their heads--but this isn't really the point. The point is that we will be showing them and others the way to sanctity as we pick it out ourselves.

We need merely remember St. Thérèse's small service of a smile to a person who irritated her beyond words. And this small action seemed to have effected a change in the recipient through the love shown. But we cannot love with this in mind, we must only love with the idea that what we have is God's gift to us for the moment. Whatever it may consist of, however we must deal with it, God is showing us moment by moment how to ascend to Him. When we abandon ourselves (which, of course we can only do with His help) we can begin to walk that path. The path of detachment will not seem so hard when we see in every step the path that leads to life.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:07 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

January 18, 2005

Being Who You Are in Christ

Another insight into St. John of the Cross.

from Ascent to Love
Ruth Burrows

John is 'at home' in religious life. . . whereas when he attempts to carry his principles into secular life we feel he is floundering. As we read through his treatment of detachment from joy in the use of temporal, natural, sensible goods (his own categories) we cannot avoid the impression that he is a man ill-at-ease in the workaday world. For him it is infinitely preferable to get rid of all possessions, remain celibate, live in retirement and give oneself up to prayer; all else is second best. . . . The whole world is the Lord's, he is in all and not only in one tiny consecrated corner. All is sacred, the house of the Lord and the gate of heaven. John might prefer everyone to be within the cloister but God does not!

All John writes must therefore be interpreted using the insights of our own day, but his basic principles remain unchallenged--nothing and no one can be our ultimate joy or security. There has to be detachment coupled with great involvement and one does not rule out the other. Take John's rather down-graded view of marriage, for example, and put it against our own developing appreciation of just what marriage is meant to be. It is the way par excellance for the vast majority to grow into freedom and fulness of love, the vehicle of transcendence. What displine, sacrifice, asceticism, will be needed for it to reach this ideal! And when the partners have truly become two in one and then comes the separation of death--how incalcuable the wound! Yes, but the very fact that the marriage has reached fulfilment will mean that the other can stand alone, continuing to grow in freedom and love. All human situations are open to God. Prayer, constant reflection on the gospel, desire, vigiliance--these will reveal how, in the concrete, hour by hour, we find him in them, respond to him in them.

I especially liked the very logical, very practical insight that "ohn might prefer everyone to be within the cloister but God does not!" We have so high a regard for clergy and relgious (rightfully so) that we sometimes fail to see that the vast majority of us are not and never have been and as the Lord is doing the calling, either a great many of us are not listening too well or He calls most of us to sanctity outside the bounds of the cloister or clergy. This is simply a fact, not a statement as to who has "the better part."

But marriage is the perfect training ground for detachment, sacrifice, and love. Anyone who is or has been a parent recalls the sacrifices required when children are very young--sleepless nights, endless labor over a little one. And for a very long time, this effort may transmute but it never goes away. For example, how often does daddy's dinner (when eating out) look ever so much more appealing than what is on my own plate? Then add to that time that we'd rather be doing other things but must heed the necessity to play with, train up, advise, admonish, discipline, and just plain talk to our children.

And then there is the endless battle of wills that comprises a marriage--the misconmmunications, the hurt feelings, the endless unappreciatied labors. We bring forth each new, completed work and hold it out for an awed moment of silence, only to have it pushed away as our spouse bustles by with an armload of laundry. This isn't uncaring, this isn't unsupportive, this is merely the fullness of the day. And when we reach its end too often we are exhausted by all of its contingencies to properly express our appreciation of one another. And yet, the current flows through it and sustains it. We are servants to each other, we are Christ for each other, slowly dragging our partners toward salvation in a waltz that becomes a tango that becomes a wrestling match that feels like it will never end.

Oh yes, marriage is the perfect training ground for detachment, for giving up our need and desire to control another, for giving up our own way and going with the way of service. Every moment of every day opens up wide vistas of opportunity for service to one another. Detachment picks service rather than our own will in a given matter. Detachment always looks for the betterment of all and for God's will in a situation. Detachment means leaving the ego behind and not resenting giving half of one's dinner to an anxious, joyous, overwhelming six-year-old. Detachment means dropping our little golden crown and helping our spouses carry the laundry to the washing machine or the garbage to the road.

It is in marriage that most of us in St. Blogs are called to find Christ.The circumstances are such that we will be able to practice in all fullness the disciplines of detachment and selfless love, always keeping in mind that these are never our own, but graces given freely by God to strengthen us and our families. So the teachings of St. John of the Cross, rooted in the cloister and the convent, reach out and touch us in the apartment and the living room. We are not excused because we are not cloistered, but rather, we are called upon to an even more heroic exercise of selflessness because we do not have the moments of solitude that rebuild. While we are not called to the strictness of the cloister, neither do we have some of the advantages that accrue there. And yet our lives are graced by a sacrament that works to make us holy in the vocation to which we have been called.

So, while we may not be able to observe all the particulars of the specific discpline that St. John of the Cross calls for, the doctrine he teaches holds true. Emptying and selflessness make room for Him to come and dwell and when he is dwelling at the heart of the family there is no toil, no turmoil, no trouble so great that it does not make the family stronger and bring them closer to Him. This is part of the meaning of the sacrament of marriage. And within it we must find the balance between intimacy and true loving support and detachment from our own needs that will best move everyone toward Christ. As the chief officers on the ship we are responsible to see that she sails properly toward the Homeland.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:48 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 14, 2005

Beginning the Ascent

An interesting bit of serendipity stemming from yesterday's writing regarding the Letter to the Philippians. I had not yet encountered this passage from Sr. Ruth's book. Even if God isn't talking to anyone else, He sure is hammering home the message to me.

from Ascent to Love
Ruth Burrows

John says if you want God, if you want to begin the ascent of the mountain, then you have to make a decision against self-importance. You have to remove yourself from the centre-stage, see yourself as a member of a family, a community which you must serve. This is what Jesus taught and Paul after him. Never think yourself more important than others, never put yourself before them. . . . Think little of yourself and be happy that others do not consider you very important. Have a lowly opinion of yourself, not in the sense of unhealthy self-denigration but in that you do not consider yourself the pivot of the universe. Keep correcting in the silence of your heart the contrary natural attitude. Keep reminding yourself that others are more important than you are, that their well-being is more than the satisfaction of your ego. Let your actions conform to the this truth. Do not demand that circumstances change to fit you, do not labour to control events for your own benefit. See yourself as the servant of others.

Okay, now time for the really hard questions. How many of us, well-intentioned though we may be actually live this? How many of us really see ourselves as servants? I might use the language, but is my real image of myself that of one who waits on others? Absolutely not! I am in a position where I am required to lead others, to send them here and there, to tell them what to do, how could I possibly be a servant. The reality of the matter is that whatever it is I do here and now, it is momentary--a task that is not eternal. I must practice whatever influence I have circumspectly, realizing that I am the servant of all in Christ. In fact, I should seek to be the servant of the servants of God, thinking nothing whatsoever of myself, but seeking to give all in service. For example, as a husband I should seek to serve the needs of my family, caring more for the needs of my wife and my son than for my own. If I do things that are not acknowledged as readily as I would like, then so long as I do not become nonplussed and put-out about that fact, it is a jewel in the crown. Because just as I owe them this service, so to they "owe" it to me. I should not sit around waiting to be waited on. Rather, I should work to be a greater servant. I should do as I would be done by--not because I expect the return of the favor, but because it is the right thing for a servant of the Most High to do. Treat others as you would be treated and do not expect to be treated in return with this high regard.

I think one of the hardest things for the rugged individualism of the people of the U.S. is to think of ourselves as all connected. And if we are all connected the really difficult thing is to seek to be in the portion that serves, not in the portion that is served. We need to break down the arrogance of our false masks of freedom, independence, and stoic isolation and surrender entirely to the notion that by our baptism we are called to service. This means service of rude people, mean people, people who you'd really rather just kick and get it over with.

There is no real love without service. St. Thérèse of Lisieux taught that love is not merely a feeling, and not merely an act of the will, but it is expressed in concrete terms of small individual services. It needn't be anything spectacular. For example, I might serve someone by listening to them with a patience I do not have--by listening when I really just want them to come to the point and be done with it--by not deconstructing everything they say into the components of self-importance they seem to represent. Service takes many small steps.

"Think little of yourself." I like this expression for its productive ambiguity. It is both to think of yourself as small and as a servant, but it is also not to so intensively direct your thoughts inward. Rather think little of yourself and let the majority of your thoughts ascend to the throneroom of Heaven. Think little of yourself and more about who needs help and what form that help can take. Think little of yourself and rejoice in the good that accrues to others. Think little of yourself and immerse yourself in the vast world of all that God has laid out for you. Let your gaze follow that of the Blessed Mother, babe in arms, and let it rest always upon the face of Jesus--the face of the person God has sent to you in this moment.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:28 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

January 13, 2005

The Purpose of Self-Denial

from Ascent to Love
Ruth Burrows

The whole aim of John's asceticism is to release us from the tyranny of the ego. Influenced by his scholastic framework he seems to write as if the senses had a life of their own and must control their actions; that the appetites, passions and emotions must likewise curb themselves. But of course, this is not so. It is really the will, the faculty of choosing, that is involved. True, the eye sees, the ear hears automatically; passions are aroused automatically, but it is the will that must choose to turn away the eyes, refuse to listen, control the instincts. Everything therefore will depend on what I really want, what I prize, what I hold to be my true good. Meditation, as we have said, keeps us looking at the values of Jesus so that we may choose to make these our own. Jesus is always summoning us beyond ourselves to the Father, bidding us deny the powerful tendency to seek fulfilment within ourselves and the limits of the created, making the aggrandisement of the ego the implicit motivation of our thinking and acting.

Throughout life at different times each of us faces the trials experienced by Jesus in Luke 4.

Luke 4:1-14

And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit [2] for forty days in the wilderness, tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing in those days; and when they were ended, he was hungry. [3] The devil said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread." [4] And Jesus answered him, "It is written, `Man shall not live by bread alone.'" [5] And the devil took him up, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, [6] and said to him, "To you I will give all this authority and their glory; for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. [7] If you, then, will worship me, it shall all be yours." [8] And Jesus answered him, "It is written, `You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.'"
[9] And he took him to Jerusalem, and set him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here; [10] for it is written, `He will give his angels charge of you, to guard you,' [11] and `On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.'" [12] And Jesus answered him, "It is said, `You shall not tempt the Lord your God.'" [13] And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time. [14]And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee, and a report concerning him went out through all the surrounding country.

Unfortunately, more often than not, we do not respond as Jesus does. For a variety of reasons, different reasons at different times, we succumb to the temptations offered. The reason for meditating on the Scriptures and for practicing a certain level of self denial is to prepare us for the time when these temptations present themselves. Jesus "practiced" self-control and self-denial in a marathon 40 day fast in the desert. He withdrew from all of the wonderful things of God's creation--food, wine, people, comfortable lodging, everything that we see as the necessary minimum in life. This prepared Him for answering Satan when the temptation was offered.

Now few of us are up to a complete fast for even a single day. The thought of a pang of hunger is enough to send us running to our pantries to check out our famine supplies. But neither God nor St. John of the Cross is telling us that it is a really good idea to fast for forty days. In fact, for some of us that presents a temptation all its own--the temptation to being "holier than thou." A kind of spiritual "extreme sports." 'I can fast longer than you can AND I can sit on a taller pole in a higher wind.' "Well I'll take your fast and raise you a 10 cord discipline twice a day.' It sounds silly, but people being what they are seem to be able to take pride in just about anything.

What we learn from St. John of the Cross is that we do well to deprive ourselves of small luxuries, things that in the normal course of life no one will notice except God. Then we are neither likely to take pride in them--so long as we do not deliberately bring them to the notice of others--nor are they likely to derail us by their sheer heroism. In fact, the are more likely to reinforce humility when we realize the tremendous effort we must take to momentarily deprive ourselves of something we don't really need anyway.

And all of this is about conforming the will to what God would have us do. We must make the choices, we must take action--but our action must conform to God's plan for us for it to mean anything. And this is the purpose of any self-denial or any discipline we impose. If our goal is anything less than total-self-giving to God, our actions will not have their intended consequences. As Sister Ruth points out, we must make the choice for our own greatest good. And the difficulty there is that we must wake up and come to realize what our own greatest good entails. Meditating on the scriptures will help us to open our eyes and to see what is right there in front of us, rather than what is six years (six years we don't have) down the line either direction.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:24 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

January 12, 2005

Fleeing or Being?

from Ascent to Love
Ruth Burrows

We cannot sufficiently stress the need for emotional control, especially today when the reaction to emotional repressions of the past has caused the pendulum to swing the other way. In certain circles feelings are taken as all-important. An enormous amount of attention is given to them with the result that people are very conscious of how they feel and quick to think they have an absolute right to feel 'well'. . . . It seems to me that sooner or later each of us has to learn to put up with painful emotions, pay little attention to them, get on with doing what we have to do, attending to our neighbours' welfare, putting all our trust in God. We who know Jesus can surely afford to feel insecure--if we do! We can afford to feel fragile, fearful. Surely these painful emotions can be an opportunity for pure trust. . . .

We find it hard to give up the idea that there is a magic answer somewhere, that it must be possible to get this burden off our backs. We have deep conviction that we are being wronged: our environment is wrong, our companions are responsible; if we had a different job, if this person was not around, if,if, if. There is no answer but facing reality. Do we not see that the truly happy people are not those who have spent themselves avoiding life’s difficulties, seeking escapes and alleviations, trying to control life so as to provide a secure base for the ego, but those who have done battle with themselves, who have tried, not to change the world but to change themselves, to adapt, to accept, to bend, to die. It is a strange thing that one of the hardest things some people are asked to do is precisely to stop being miserable, to choose to be happy in a world of limitations, the world that really is, not the world of make-believe! We prefer to cling on to self-pity, self-contempt, self-recrimination. At least it is safe. It means I cannot be disappointed and no one can blame me for not expecting too much of myself or of life. Such an attitude is an escape from living and loving. It is an egocentric prison.

[Emphasis added]

What I love about Sr. Ruth's book is that she details certain points at which the modern psyche so completely diverges from the "weltanschauung" of St John's time that we must be careful about how we follow his advice. That the emphasis on HOW to go about things has shifted a bit, even though the things we must be about remain eternal.

I also like the head-on confrontation with the common complaints, experiences, attitudes, and actions of the present day. I cannot tell you how many people I know who have knowingly or unknowingly bought into Robert Schuller's "be-happy" or "prosperity" gospel. As a society we long to feel good about ourselves. We seek to make the road as smooth and painless as possible. Sometimes this means that rather than helping the poor myself, because I can't possibly fit it into the schedule of a busy family life, I give money to let others help the poor. Giving money is a very, very good thing to do, especially to legitimate agents who can reach into places too distant for me to touch. However, that does not remove the necessity for me to substantively help the poor in the place where I live. It does not remove the obligation for serving in soup kitchens or helping the St. Vincent de Paul society at my church.

There are other attitudes. "I am Christian and God promised Christians a happy life." Now, I doubt anyone says this quite so boldly; however, it seems to be an underlying attitude. As soon as I run up against a snag, it's time to flee. I shouldn't be inconvenienced. I certainly shouldn't be harmed or caused distress.

St. John of the Cross suggests that the remedy is to choose the most unpleasant tasks--to inure oneself to the idea that we are not promised a bouquet of roses. His chief modern explicator St. Thérèse of Lisieux has quite a different take on the matter. She tells us that life deals quite a few bad hands as it is--it isn't up to us to make our hand worse, but rather play the hand we are dealt with as much joy and fervor as if it were the ultimate winning hand--because, in point of fact, it is. So Thérèse tells us that we don't have to use the discipline and the calice to mortify ourselves--life offers ample opportunities. (As one who died so young she did not experience all the opportunities of old age--but I think the rigors of tuberculosis are quite sufficient to make what she had to say a living reality.) For Thérèse, we don't have to go out and look for trouble, we can find it in the person of the old nun down the way whom no one likes and at whom Thérèse makes a special effort to smile and be pleasant--not because Thérèse felt any marvelous love for this woman, but she nevertheless trained her will to act in love to all.

Our modern world has rigors all its own--pains, pressures, fears, hurts, losses. When faced with one of these we can either choose to flee (the course I know I most often take) or to face them as God's intent for the moment and be strengthened by living the moment and deriving from it the grace God has offered. This is not to promote a kind of false stoicism, but rather to acknowledge as the Buddha did that life is suffering, pain, and hardship (in some large proportion). If we flee these, we flee life itself. We flee the strengthening that comes through testing and endurance, we flee the opportunity for abandonment and trust. That is not to say that we should not take steps to alleviate what suffering we can; however, the reality is that no matter how much pain is removed, there will always be something left that we will either endure or flee. It is better for us to endure it, not because suffering in itself is good or because God wants us to suffer, but because God has allowed it and through it and through our reliance on Him graces will accrue.

If we are paying attention, Thérèse tells us, life offers enough opportunities for mortification and for uniting our sufferings to those of Jesus on the Cross. We needn't go out and seek more. And Thérèse is, in many ways, the "modern" voice of St. John of the Cross. She has taken his teaching and distilled it into a more-or-less modern context. (Although truthfully, even her time is quite distant from our own in many very important ways.) What Sr. Ruth emphasizes in her work is that the truth of St. John of the Cross endures even if some of the methods might be better suited for his own time rather than our own. However, it is necessary to separate the kernel from the hull, because we would tend, on our own, to discard both. The practice is outmoded so the teaching must be perishable. What St. John of the Cross teaches endures--whether the practices he enjoins are meant to be taken for our own times is up to the individual with the help of a spiritual guide to find out. But the truth of the way of self-denial, of taking up our crosses, is not one that originated with St. John of the Cross--he was, perhaps, one of the greatest of its explicators, but the truth is eternal. As with Holy Mother Church--the doctrine is eternal but subject to growth and reinterpretation through time, but the discipline is for the time and it may vary from age to age without any reflection upon the eternal verities in which She is grounded.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:18 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 11, 2005

More from Sr. Burrows

I was very excited to read these two passages:

from Ascent to Love
Ruth Burrows

Everything we perceive that does not help us to grow in love of God and others must be denied at whatever cost. 'If your eye is a cause of stumbling to you,' says Jesus, 'put it out.' A highly charged metaphor to impress on us the unutterable importance of pleasing God, living as he would have us live. Nothing counts beside this, not our pleasure and satisfaction, not an easy comfortable life, not wide experience of sense, not 'happiness'--nothing. All occasions of sin must be avoided absolutely in so far as depends on us. When they cannot be avoided and we find ourselves caught up in pleasures that do not help us to God then we must detach ourselves from them, refuse to savour them. But the pleasure that attends all innocent use of created things is to be enjoyed reverently and gratefully. There is no question of denying ourselves just for the sake of doing so, as though this is what God wants. . . .

We need pleasure, but it may be that earnest love sees that we cannot hope to deny ourselves wrong pleasures unless we have undergone a prepartory discipline and learned to say no to perfectly innocent ones. This renunciation is for a purpose; one might say it is a temporary expediency. Our use of creatures, whether we forgo this or that, will be a very personal matter. Nobody can make rules for another. . . . But when all is said and done it is we who must make the decision, and never are we more lonely than when we do so in moral areas. Each has his or her own vocation in life with its own specific demands. No one can live out the full range of human/christian values. We have to choose, and the choice depends on the vocation to which God has called us.

To reply to a previous commenter--how often do you hear this on Oprah or from Pollyanna? Deny yourself--reject legitimate pleasures? More often we hear "Seize the day." Sr. Ruth is not offering us a way of lollipops and roses, nor is a way for perfect people. Sr. Ruth is pointing our the path clearly marked by St. John of the Cross. This is reality, hard and fast reality. Admittedly it is reality of a higher order than many of us ever experience, but it is not of a higher order than what God offers for us to experience.

But what I liked here is the notion that sometimes denial of innocent pleasures is a kind of training for denial of those not-so-innocent. So, in a sense, we give up those things we crave the most as a mortification. We give up beer or wine or chocolate so that we are better equipped to give up taking lustful pleasure in looking at a woman (or man) etc. I will have to weigh this all out, but it is commensurate with John's actual life as reported by others. He loved the countryside and often spent time wandering there. If these created things gave him pleasure and the point of detachment was simply to remove everything that gives pleasure, then we would not have wandered in the fields or spent time in nature in prayer. So this interpretation of Sr. Burrows rings true both with the magnificent poetry and with the life of St. John of the Cross. Now, the danger lies in being too lenient with ourselves as well. How much enjoyment is innocent. How do I stop at the chocolate before gluttony? As Sr. Burrows points out, the choices and the use of created things is something that must be decided by the individual in council with a wise advisor.

So detachment is not about denial for the sake of denial, but carefully considered and discerned denial in service of growing in love of God. We rely upon grace for all of this, we cannot do it unaided, but we must also rely upon carefully considered human reason, to help us make our choices and to discern properly. If we must give up something, if me must deny ourselves, that too should be in pursuit of the ultimate goal--not denial for its own sake, but denial to help foster deeper love of God.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 10:41 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

On the Difficulties of St. John of the Cross

Because she is such a hit with a least one reader, more from Sister Ruth.

from Ascent to Love
Ruth Burrows

John can sometimes give the impression that we must renounce all love of creatures:'He who loves anything besides God is incapable of divine union'. . . But of course God is not an object and therefore lies totally ouitside the range of our thinking, imagining, loving. One of the implications of his hiddenness is that he cannot be held, looked at, enjoyed directly in this life. He is in all; things are only because of his self-communication to them. To love anyone or anything purely is to love him; to relate them in accordance with his designs is to be in union with him. In our unsullied enjoyment of creatures, in our delight in others, we are enjoying and delight in him. We ask everyone and everything about him:'Has he passed by you? Show me what he is like. Tell me of him. We ask these questions not merely with the mind in meditation; we ask in action by using creatures as they should be used.

It would be very easy to misread this. Some apparently have already done so; however, understood correctly, I think Sr. Ruth is, on the whole, on-target here. Any creature available to the senses can be loved either for itself or for God in it. That is we can seek to use it illicitly or licitly. When we see God through the object or person, we are loving properly. It is the object of our love that is critical. Do we love what the person or thing can do for us, or do we love that person or thing as an object of God's love and being? I apologize because I recognize that I am not making clear what I really want to say here; and it does seem really quite simple. However language is so fraught with implicit dangers that it is difficult to say. Were I to say that we are to "love God in the creature" it might imply that we could not love the creature--that is bestow some good upon it as a logical outgrowth of love. But that is not what is meant. We must love God in the creature and the creature as an outgrowth of our love of God, thus we may do good as an outgrowth of that love. But more often than not we love the creature only for what it can do for us. We love money, or we love some other legitimate good, not because they give glory to God, but because they give glory to us. The proper use of creatures is a very difficult line to define. That may be why St. John of the Cross is so frequently misunderstood to say abandon all creatures. He does not do so. And yet, as Jesus instructs us, it is better to abandon them, even be they so close as our own eye or hand, than to be unable to enter the kingdom. When we begin to love and lust after a creature for itself rather than for God-in-it, we have moved from the proper "use" of things into the self-aggrandizement of the ego.

This is what St. John of the Cross would have us understand, I think. Anything created thing we want for the thing itself becomes an object that bars us from further growth in God. However anything loved for the loved of God can help us on our way.

It makes a certain amount of sense. Out of love for the nuns at Beas, St. John of the Cross wrote many of these works and commentaries. Obviously he did not abandon, no more did he cease to love them. He loved them for God -in-them (purely) and was led naturally to seek their betterment as love will do.

The proper use of created things is use according to their dignity, stature, and ordained purpose in bringing us closer to God. Any use other than that is obstructive to our growth and it may be sin. We cannot love creatures for what we can get from them in this world and still aspire to the kingdom of God.

(Or, at least, so my weak understanding carries me. There are a great many unresolved questions regarding this in my own mind and my formulation is far from complete, but here's a start.)

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:47 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 10, 2005

Our Relationship With Created Things

According to the interpretation of St. John of the Cross by Sr. Ruth Burrows.

I loved this passage and I dedicate it especially to Rob.

from Ascent to Love
Ruth Burrows

Turning now to the Ascent we understand that John is not demanding that we cast a pall over all created things and live in some sort of void but that we impose a night on the ego. 'It is not the things of this world that ensnare and injure the soul, for they do not enter within it, but the desire for them which abides within it, that is the ego which always seeks itself and therefore abuses and destroys." The ego curls inwards and, like a carnivorous flower, draws everything else within it, destroying both them and itself. This ego-centred movement is a perversion, it is disobedience in the fullest sense. It is sin. In Paul's terms it is the flesh that lusteth against the spirit. Called beyond ourself to the enfolding transforming love of the infinite, and never happy save in obedience to this call, we nevertheless shrink from commitment to it. Innately obstinate in us (and how strong!) is that which expects, demands, looks for fulfilment within this world, even though we know experientially and intellectually that it cannot be.

I love the metaphor of the carnivorous plant and particularly the lovely use of the word "curl" rather than "turn." Curling suggests a withering, a drying up, a post-mortem effect. That is the place of the ego--withering and death. It is the place of the spirit where we have enfolding and unfolding and the transformation of the seen into the plant.

In case you can't tell, I'm really enjoying sister Ruth's book. It seems so practical, down-to-earth, and ordinary. It takes away the sting of much of the phrasing of St. John of the Cross and reveals (or so I think) the underlying truth of what he teaches about the Spritiual life.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:40 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

The End for Which We Are Made

This weekend I asked my Carmelite community whether detachment was a means or an end. We concluded that it was something of both (at least for Carmelites). That is, the real end is loving God completely and having complete freedom in God. For this to happen, we must be stripped of everything that has a tendency to keep us from God; hence detachment is a means. Nevertheless, once we have achieved the real end--proper love of God, we will also have achieved detachment whether or not we have consciously striven for it. The two fit hand-in-glove. So, while there may be other paths to achieve union with God, they all ultimately involve dying to self. Now this prospect sounds hideous, but I think this passage from Ruth Burrows clarifies what is meant.

from Ascent to Love
Ruth Burrows

We ourselves are mystery and our proper ambience is mystery. When we speak of God's hiddenness we are saying he is the answer to our yearning. He is unfathomable mystery offered to us. Through Jesus he reveals himself not only as our beloved--the object of desire--but as our lover. The we realise that he has always been our beloved for the simple reason that he is our lover. We learn that there is a fulfilment to our endless longing but not within ourselves, not with the limitations of this world or our own achievements, but as pure gift. There is an inevitable conflict between our true self and its deepest desire to be enfolded, possessed by our beloved, and the innate drive to control, posses, to find fulfilment within ourselves. This we can call the ego. It is our basic self-orientation which is a dead end. Let us say the true self is loyal to transcendence, the ego betrays it and settles for limitation. 'We must courageously resolve to pass both interiorly and exteriorly beyond the limits of our own nature, so as to enter illimitably within the supernatural which has no measure and contains all measure within itself. " But it is precisely our nature to go beyond the limits of our nature so as to enter into God! The self must triumph over the ego.

When we speak of dying to self, this is what we are referring to. We must put aside the ego--the false self, the sense of ourselves that we have constructed and by which we identify ourselves, and discover our identities in Christ. In Sr. Burrows's words, it is the ego that must die so that the self can assume its proper and divinely appointed place within the body.

Naturally we fear this because once our construct is dead, we will be naked and exposed. The whole world we see us for what we are and we do not know what that will be. Nevertheless, if what lies buried under this burden of ego (speaking for myself) resembles St. Anselm, St. Patrick, St. Thomas More, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Francis Xavier, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Clare of Assisi, etc. then what have I to fear when I stand exposed? The world may hate me, but God will have taken me and made me already one with Him in the body of Christ, aware of who and what I am and what my purpose for His glory is. Even at a distance I can acknowledge this as what I would like to achieve. Loving union with God for all eternity starting here and now--for that end the stripping away of ego, no matter how painful, is worth the effort and the pain. Now, it's just overcoming the fear and the selfishness that hold me back.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:57 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 6, 2005

Human Transcendance

I really liked this passage from early on in Sr. Ruth Burrows's book.

from Ascent to Love
Sr. Ruth Burrows

John is enamoured of human transcendence. 'One single thought of man is greater than all the world; only God is worthy of it.' We are made for the infinite and degrade ourselves if we opt for less.

The whole creation compared with the inifinite being of God is nothing. All the beauty of creation compared with His beauty is sheer ugliness; all its delicate loveliness merely repulsive. Compared with the goodness of God the goodness of the entire world is rather evil. All wisdom, all human understanding beside his is pure ignorance. . . and so it is with sweetness, pleasures, riches, glory, freedom.

This is a hymn to human transcendence not a denigration of created reality. John's pathway up the mount could rightly be entitled, 'On becoming human'.

Later I shall post Sr. Ruth's view of the universality of John's doctrine. (Note, the universality of the doctrine, but not especially of the means. John's teaching on the spiritual realm (as well as Teresa's and Thérèse's) is what had made him a Doctor of the Church universal. But his means of achieving what he describes is peculiar to those pursuing the Carmelite vocation (either within the family or unknowingly on their own. One supposes that it is possible, all unknowingly to follow the via negativa outlined by John).

What is interesting here is the thought that every human thought is exalted above all creation and hence only worthy to be directed for Him who is greater than all creation. Our words have power so too our thought.

I also think it very important to point out that John thinks the created realm is very good indeed. He acknowledges throughout this short passage all the beauty and glory of creation and then moves on to say, nevertheless, these are less than dust compared to the creator of beauty and loveliness.

When we think about the created realm, that is the proper order of thoughts. Not good and evil (although evil does exist and should be acknowledged) but rather in the normal course, the proper ordering of goods. Detachment, in Carmelite thinking is "choosing the better part," or the greatest good. It isn't about rejecting the goodness of creation but more thoroughly embracing it in the embrace of the greatest Good--the God who loves us.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:23 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 5, 2005

One View of Carmel

from Ascent to Love
Ruth Burrows

The Order of Carmel stands for the mystical. Everything in its teaching and way of life as established by St. Teresa is directed precisely towards this. A full flowering of the mystical life and the Christian life are one and the same thing. The culmination, perfection, fulfilment of the Christian life--'all that the Lord has promised'-- is, in our special terminology, the mystical marriage or the transforming union. The ascent of Mount Carmel is but the fulness of the Christian life, which is synonymous with the fulness of human being. There are not two vocations, one to human fulfilment and the other, if we are special and privileged, to Christian fulfilment. There is only one fulfilment to be achieved either in this world or the next, that which we call mystical marriage or transforming union.

This is essentially what Carmel means to me. It is a view of human life translated into a definite purpose and aim. Climbing a mountain to meet God? Yes. But the mountain itself is God and he cannot be scaled by merely human endeavour. What Carmel does is to disengage the bare components of the human vocation, what is really involved in being human, and tries to live them in an absolute, naked sort of way. So convinced am I that Carmel is nothing other than a living out in a stark manner what is the very essence of the human vocation that, were I to come across any practice, ideal, principle, which has not its correlative in life 'outside' it would be jettisoned as unauthentic. There is a distinction between living Carmel and living in Carmel, just as there is between being a Christian and practising the Christian religion. It is the former that matters, and the later is useless unless it leads to the primary goal.

That is one very clear, very succinctly stated view of what it means to be a Carmelite. And, I think from my brief experience of it, largely true. Living Carmel is more important than being a Carmelite. As with any vocation it is a matter of growing into it.

Carmel's vocation is a unique statement of the universal vocation. We are not all called to achieve this end in the same way, but we are all called to achieve the end defined in Carmelite terms as "mystical marriage or transforming union." The way one goes about arriving at this end is unique to the individual. Some have been so fortunate as to be called to a certain rule and rigor--the path is, more or less, laid out for them. But even within a vocation the paths vary depending upon the individual. This must be so because Saints are not carbon copies of one another. There is only one St. Francis even though the saints among the followers of his way are innumerable. So too with St. Dominic, St. Teresa, and any other saint. While the rule may be clear, within that rule is a magnificent wideness that allows for us to be precisely whom Jesus calls us to be. Those without a vocation in a rule still have the universal vocation to holiness and to growing into God. Frankly, I don't remember what it was like to live that way outside of Carmel. Even though I have not attained even a good standard discipline (never mind perfection) in obedience to the rule that governs my life; nevertheless, it is always there and always a significant part of what I do and think, and God willing, through time, I'll become a better exemplar of it.

But the point or end of life is the same for all. Carmelites call it the Ascent of Mount Carmel, the Mystical or Spiritual Marriage, the Transforming Union, or any number of other things. But it is very simply stated in the words of our Lord, "I must decrease so the He might increase." This is the Christian vocation. We must become less ourselves so, paradoxically, we can be fully ourselves in Him. The only identity we have is in Christ and so long as we try to define ourselves, we are failing to find out who we are. The entire point of all Christian living is to love God and to achieve the personhood God has set aside for us by joining Him. This will happen to everyone who follows Him faithfully--as Sr. Ruth says above, either in this life or in the life to come.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:02 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 4, 2005

The Gracious Art of Detachment

I stumbled across this passage in a new book obtained from Amazon the other day.

from Ascent to Love: The Spiritual Teaching of St. John of the Cross
Ruth Burrows

We have an innate drive to seek our own perfection with the dimensions of what we understand and consciously experience. We think we know what we need for our well-being and happiness and demand this of life. This is very marked today when greater opportunities are available. We say we must feel fulfilled, that we have a right to this or that because we need it for our fulfilment. We must not be diminished or feel frustrated in our desires. But the truth is that we do not know what human fulfilment is. We can neither conceive of it nor the path to it except in Jesus and him crucified. To seek what we think is fulfilment, making it our sole aim and subordinating other people and things to our own needs is to lose our way. We must allow God to bring us to the fulfillment he has made us for, by a way that is infallible because it is his way for us. We must be brought to dispossession, emptiness, formlessness. A dreadful prospect? Does not this spell death to a human being? Paradoxically, no, it is the other side of the plenitude of life. It is to enter into him who is all, to be filled by the all.

The detached heart has a far greater joy and comfort in created realities, for to treat them possessively is to lose all joy in them. . . . The whole created world is illumined and seen for what it is in a way the selfish heart can never know. The unselfish heart alone knows the joy of pure love for others. The more another is loved, the more God is loved.

In the past, I have written of detachment and sometimes I have to keep a clear focus on the fact that detachment is not an end in itself, but a means to the only End worthy of consideration. But here, for me, there was a breath of the truth, another confirmation of what I know instinctively. Detachment is not the rejection of created things, but the proper valuing of created things in subordination to the love of the Creator of All. In this proper alignment of values, created things become all the more wonderful and real because we can allow them to be without having to have some sort of control over them or possession of them.

How many relationships would be healed if we stopped the endless need to impose our own will on others? How many people would come to love more and to follow Jesus more closely if they were to abandon their own ways and to take up his? In every disagreement, in every quarrel, in every negative human interaction, the predominant element is the need of one person to express him or herself through the control of another. And the one being controlled lashes out in response to this attempt at possession. But if we belong only to God, we would not have to lash out against those who would possess us because we know clearly to whom we belong.

If we seek Him in love, all other things will not fall away, but they will fall into place. He is the keystone of the arch, the anchor of the edifice. If God is at the center everything holds together. If anything else, "Things fall apart, the center cannot hold, mere anarchy is loosed upon the world." Only in God will my soul be at rest--in Him is my hope, my salvation (in the language of the psalms). Detachment is a secondary means to an end and it is achieved by focus on the primary means--love of God above all things.

But this doesn't mean that detachment is something easy to come by and simply acted upon. It is not. It takes a grace-strengthened act of will to resist the lure of possession. From the beginning we seek to possess, because possession seems to fill the aching void within. But the only possession that really fills that void is, paradoxically, being possessed, not ourselves owning anything, but being owned, redeemed, notably His. "Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm." We need to wear His insignia, His band upon our arms. In this we are enslaved to all and completely free. The words make no sense at all, and yet I think we understand the reality they express at some very deep level.

And (is it because of the fall?) every fiber of our being resists this possession. We seek to identify ourselves and make ourselves known to the world at large. But our only identity is in Christ, our only meaning in God. Outside of Him nothing we do, say, or have has any substance. The more we own, the more that owns us, and the more the gnawing, all consuming hunger drives us to acquire yet more.

Detachment which comes through Love of God and graced acts of will places us in the seat of greatest joy. We need not own anything and nothing owns us except Him who is entitled. How can this reality not appeal? How can moving closer to all and away from the nothingness of everyday desire not be the burning drive of our hearts? I don't know, but too often it is so. As for me, I pray it cease as soon as it can. I would like to say with Joshua, "As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." And I cannot so long as I am busy serving myself

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:19 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

January 3, 2005

Saying of the Day

I share this because it has impinged itself on my consciousness at least five or six times in the past few days. I don't offer any relevance, but seeing as it is so frequent a visitor to the untrouble mud-puddle surface of my mind, I thought I'd share:

"When evening comes, you will be examined in love." (Sayings, 60)

Posted by Steven Riddle at 3:09 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

October 19, 2004

Study Guide--The Ascent of Mount Carmel XIII

It's about that time again. Actually, it's well past that time again. Here's the next installment.

Study Guide for The Ascent of Mount Carmel

Read chapters 18-19, p. 210-219 in the Collected Works

Chapter 18--Describes also how these visions may cause deception even though they be of God.

1-2. What is St. John's chief reason for writing at such length about visions?

5-7. These paragraphs discuss what a spiritual guide or spiritual director should do and often does not do in the face of such visions. What is St. John's main theme throughout this section? Why does he consider this so important?

8-9. What is one of the chief dangers of entertaining visions? Why might this occur?

Chapter 19--Wherein is expounded and proved how, although visions and locutions which come from God are true, we may be deceived about them. This is proved by quotations from Divine Scripture.

Choose one of the examples that St. John lists , and "make it your own." Read the passages he refer to in the Bible, look at what God says and how people interpret it. Be ready to explain how God's word is true even though people are looking for something else.

How does this relate to the danger of visions and locutions? Why does it provide further evidence of what we should not do?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:43 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 15, 2004

On Visions, Locutions, and Prophecies

. . . and their proper interpretation

from The Ascent of Mount Carmel
St. John of the Cross

[from Book II, Chapter 19]

For two reasons we have said that, although visions and locutions which come from God are true, and in themselves are always certain, they are not always so with respect to ourselves. One reason is the defective way in which we understand them; and the other, the variety of their causes. In the first place, it is clear that they are not always as they seem, nor do they turn out as they appear to our manner of thinking. The reason for this is that, since God is vast and boundless, He is wont, in His prophecies, locutions and revelations, to employ ways, concepts and methods of seeing things which differ greatly from such purpose and method as can normally be understood by ourselves; and these are the truer and the more certain the less they seem so to us. This we constantly see in the Scriptures. To many of the ancients many prophecies and locutions of God came not to pass as they expected, because they understood them after their own manner, in the wrong way, and quite literally. This will be clearly seen in these passages.

Guess this leaves the "Left Behinders" with rather short shrift. And well done, too. Literal reading of Biblical test is a never-ending morass of confusion and misunderstanding in many cases. One must, of course, understand the literal meaning of the words, but that does not mean that what is expressed on the face of it it what ultimately is intended by it. A simple example is when Jesus says, "I am the light of the world." We look neither for a wick, nor for a switch. We understand this to be said metaphorically. We all know this, but there are some pockets of Protestantism in particularly that insist on literal readings, most particularly of texts that were never written to be read literally. (The Apocalypse comes to mind.)

One must never attempt to understand what is being said in the Bible by leaping over the literal meaning to some cracked figurative meaning. But then neither should one stop at the literal meaning thinking that is all that is present. The word of God is sharper than any two edged sword.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:51 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

July 23, 2004

Study of The Ascent of Mount Carmel XII

If this is useful for you or your Carmelite group feel free to use it or to adpat it to better fit your own community or way of study. If you need them, I have word files for all of the parts that I should be most happy to e-mail at your request.

Study Guide for The Ascent of Mount Carmel XII

Read Chapters 16-17, pages 199-210 in the ICS Collected Works

Chapter 16

The imaginative apprehensions represented supernaturally to the phantasy are incapable of serving as a proximate means of union with God

What does St. John of the Cross mean when he says this? (For a quick review, please see II.12.4-6, pages 186-188.

(2) What are “imaginative visions?” Where do they come from? What is their purpose?

(3) Who can use these visions? To what purpose?

(4) Why would Satan take particular advantage of this way of coming to the soul? (Read carefully the last two sentences of the section.)

(5) What is the purpose in knowing the difference between good vision and bad ones?

(6) Why should one refrain from entertaining or thinking about imaginative visions?

(7) What is the difference between these visions and God’s way of working within the soul?

(8-9) Sections 8-9 deal with what the Holy Spirit reveals through Deuteronomy and Numbers. What are these revelations and how are they related to each other?

(10) Why is it unnecessary to desire visions and corporeal communications with God in order for them to have their effect within the soul? What is the advantage of NOT desiring them?

(11) Why is advantageous to divest oneself of the “stain-like figures” of imagination?

(12) On what should the eyes of the soul be fixed? What does one gain from this orientation?

(14) What is the chief danger of the unenlightened consideration that we ought to accept these visions and imaginations?

(15) What is our most effective dark candle in the darkness? How do we best follow it?

Chapter 17

God's procedure and purpose in communicating spiritual goods by means of the senses.

(1) Read the footnote associated with this section very carefully. Note what the editors say is the importance of this chapter. Break this down into key points to follow through the rest of the chapter.

(2-3) What are the three fundamental principles important to answering the questions posed in the first section? What is the importance of these?

(4) Why does God give a person visions, forms and images?

(5) “In the measure that souls approach spirit in their dealings with God, they divest and empty themselves of the ways of the sense, of discursive and imaginative meditation.” What does Saint John of the Cross have to say of the separation of the spiritual and the physical? What might it indicate? Why is this so?

(6) What is one of the chief characteristics of the perfect spirit?

(7) Why must a person not turn away from discursive meditation before the proper time? What are two reasons for not desiring visions or other supernatural communications? Of what does St. John of the Cross say, “ Such an effort is profitless, a waste of time, a hindrance to the soul, an occasion of many imperfections as well as of spiritual stagnancy. . .”?

(8) Note well: “It is regrettable that a soul, having as it were an infinite capacity, should be fed, because of its limited spirituality and sensory incapacity, with morsels for the senses.” Why should this be so?

(9) What must be the sole focus of the eyes of the Soul? Why?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:58 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

April 30, 2004

Ascent of Mount Carmel XI

The Ascent of Mount Carmel XI--Book II, Chapters 13-15

Read pages 189- 199 in The Ascent of Mount Carmel.

Chapter 13

(1) Why is it very important to know the proper time to leave discursive meditation?

(2) What is the first sign that one is ready to leave discursive mediation?

(3) What is the second sign?

(4) What is the third sign?

(5) Note the caution St. John of the Cross makes about the occurrence of these signs.

(6) Why is one or two of the signs insufficient evidence of the time to leave discursive prayer?

(7) What does John counsel about the third sign--the loving knowledge of God?

Chapter 14

(1-2) What are the two reasons for requiring spiritual persons to give up sensory meditation when the three signs are present?

(3) Why does the desire of others for them to meditate cause displeasure in those who are ready to move on?

(4) What is "the rind of the fruit" that St. John of the Cross refers to in this passage?

(6) List the two faculties St. John talks about at the end of this passage. Keep them in mind as you read the next section. He will make frequent reference to them.

(7) What is the difference between the use of the two faculties like?

(8-9) Compare the purity of knowledge in section 8 with the passage about the ray of light in section 9. What is John trying to tell us in these two passages?

(10-11) What do the purity and simplicity of knowledge cause in the intellect and soul? What is the result? Are persons working with this knowledge actually idle?

(12) Why is forgetfulness less frequent than might otherwise be the case?

Chapter 15

(1) What does St. John of the Cross say about discursive meditation among proficients? What can one expect until one becomes proficient in contemplation?

(2) How can meditation help at this point in time?

(3) Why should one abandon the attempt at discursive meditation when one enters into a state of contemplation?

(4) Why is the light never infused while one still has hold of tangible images and ideas?

(5) What should one do when one cannot meditate? Why?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 12:23 PM | TrackBack

April 23, 2004

Four Questions Part I--What is meant by Union with God?

Before I have even started, I discover four questions or clarifications necessary--an ample demonstration of the drawbacks of the blog for something of this nature. Neverhteless, the questions asked are both intriguing and important. Because I have time to answer only one, and because Neil's comment in the post below goes a long way toward answering it (even though the quotes are about contemplation, they also seem to speak of Union) --I will start with Rob's question about "What do I mean when I say Union with God."

This is an incredibly complex and difficult question. I may only get to start to answer it. If so, I'll start with the succinct version of the most persuasive definition I know: when we reach Divine Union, we "become God by participation."

Now let me extend the explanation by a quote of some length from St. John of the Cross who explains far better what is meant by this. Please forgive the rather difficult E. Allison Peers translation (the only one presently available on the web) and pay particular attention to paragraph six. I reproduce the entire chapter in the extended entry to avoid long scrolling for those who are just looking for an overview.

(I know the text is long, but it is worth your attention. If too much, just focus on paragraph six.)

from The Ascent of Mount Carmel Book II, Chapter 5
St. John of the Cross

CHAPTER V

Wherein is described what is meant by union of the soul with God. A comparison is given.[231]

FROM what has been said above it becomes clear to some extent what we mean by union of the soul with God; what we now say about it, therefore, will be the better understood. It is not my intention here to treat of the divisions of this union, nor of its parts, for I should never end if I were to begin now to explain what is the nature of union of the understanding, and what is that of union according to the will, and likewise according to the memory; and likewise what is transitory and what permanent in the union of the said faculties; and then what is meant by total union, transitory and permanent, with regard to the said faculties all together. All this we shall treat gradually in our discourse -- speaking first of one and then of another. But here this is not to the point in order to describe what we have to say concerning them; it will be explained much more fittingly in its place, when we shall again be treating the same matter, and shall have a striking illustration to add to the present explanation, so that everything will then be considered and explained and we shall judge of it better.

2. Here I treat only of this permanent and total union according to the substance of the soul and its faculties with respect to the obscure habit of union: for with respect to the act, we shall explain later, with the Divine favour, how there can be no permanent union in the faculties, in this life, but a transitory union only.

3. In order, then, to understand what is meant by this union whereof we are treating, it must be known that God dwells and is present substantially in every soul, even in that of the greatest sinner in the world. And this kind of union is ever wrought between God and all the creatures, for in it He is preserving their being: if union of this kind were to fail them, they would at once become annihilated and would cease to be. And so, when we speak of union of the soul with God, we speak not of this substantial union which is continually being wrought, but of the union and transformation of the soul with God, which is not being wrought continually, but only when there is produced that likeness that comes from love; we shall therefore term this the union of likeness, even as that other union is called substantial or essential. The former is natural, the latter supernatural. And the latter comes to pass when the two wills -- namely that of the soul and that of God -- are conformed together in one, and there is naught in the one that repugnant to the other. And thus, when the soul rids itself totally of that which is repugnant to the Divine will and conforms not with it, it is transformed in God through love.

4. This is to be understood of that which is repugnant, not only in action, but likewise in habit, so that not only must the voluntary acts of imperfection cease, but the habits of any such imperfections must be annihilated. And since no creature whatsoever, and none of its actions or abilities, can conform or can attain to that which is God, therefore must the soul be stripped of all things created, and of its own actions and abilities -- namely, of its understanding, perception and feeling -- so that, when all that is unlike God and unconformed to Him is cast out, the soul may receive the likeness of God; and nothing will then remain in it that is not the will of God and it will thus be transformed in God. Wherefore, although it is true that, as we have said, God is ever in the soul, giving it, and through His presence conserving within it, its natural being, yet He does not always communicate supernatural being to it. For this is communicated only by love and grace, which not all souls possess; and all those that possess it have it not in the same degree; for some have attained more degrees of love and others fewer. Wherefore God communicates Himself most to that soul that has progressed farthest in love; namely, that has its will in closest conformity with the will of God. And the soul that has attained complete conformity and likeness of will is totally united and transformed in God supernaturally. Wherefore, as has already been explained, the more completely a soul is wrapped up in[232] the creatures and in its own abilities, by habit and affection, the less preparation it has for such union; for it gives not God a complete opportunity to transform it supernaturally. The soul, then, needs only to strip itself of these natural dissimilarities and contrarieties, so that God, Who is communicating Himself naturally to it, according to the course of nature, may communicate Himself to it supernaturally, by means of grace.

5. And it is this that Saint John desired to explain when he said: Qui non ex sanguinibus, neque ex voluntate carnis, neque ex voluntate viri, sed ex Deo nati sunt.233 As though he had said: He gave power to be sons of God -- that is, to be transformed in God -- only to those who are born, not of blood -- that is, not of natural constitution and temperament -- neither of the will of the flesh -- that is, of the free will of natural capacity and ability -- still less of the will of man -- wherein is included every way and manner of judging and comprehending with the understanding. He gave power to none of these to become sons of God, but only to those that are born of God -- that is, to those who, being born again through grace, and dying first of all to everything that is of the old man, are raised above themselves to the supernatural, and receive from God this rebirth and adoption, which transcends all that can be imagined. For, as Saint John himself says elsewhere: Nisi quis renatus fuerit ex aqua, et Spiritu Sancto, non potest videre regnum Dei.234 This signifies: He that is not born again in the Holy Spirit will not be able to see this kingdom of God, which is the state of perfection; and to be born again in the Holy Spirit in this life is to have a soul most like to God in purity, having in itself no admixture of imperfection, so that pure transformation can be wrought in it through participation of union, albeit not essentially.

6. In order that both these things may be the better understood, let us make a comparison. A ray of sunlight is striking a window. If the window is in any way stained or misty, the sun's ray will be unable to illumine it and transform it into its own light, totally, as it would if it were clean of all these things, and pure; but it will illumine it to a lesser degree, in proportion as it is less free from those mists and stains; and will do so to a greater degree, in proportion as it is cleaner from them, and this will not be because of the sun's ray, but because of itself; so much so that, if it be wholly pure and clean, the ray of sunlight will transform it and illumine it in such wise that it will itself seem to be a ray and will give the same light as the ray. Although in reality the window has a nature distinct from that of the ray itself, however much it may resemble it, yet we may say that that window is a ray of the sun or is light by participation. And the soul is like this window, whereupon is ever beating (or, to express it better, wherein is ever dwelling) this Divine light of the Being of God according to nature, which we have described.

7. In thus allowing God to work in it, the soul (having rid itself of every mist and stain of the creatures, which consists in having its will perfectly united with that of God, for to love is to labour to detach and strip itself for God's sake of all that is not God) is at once illumined and transformed in God, and God communicates to it His supernatural Being, in such wise that it appears to be God Himself, and has all that God Himself has. And this union comes to pass when God grants the soul this supernatural favour, that all the things of God and the soul are one in participant transformation; and the soul seems to be God rather than a soul, and is indeed God by participation; although it is true that its natural being, though thus transformed, is as distinct from the Being of God as it was before, even as the window has likewise a nature distinct from that of the ray, though the ray gives it brightness.

8. This makes it clearer that the preparation of the soul for this union, as we said, is not that it should understand or perceive or feel or imagine anything, concerning either God or aught else, but that it should have purity and love -- that is, perfect resignation and detachment from everything for God's sake alone; and, as there can be no perfect transformation if there be not perfect purity, and as the enlightenment, illumination and union of the soul with God will be according to the proportion of its purity, in greater or in less degree; yet the soul will not be perfect, as I say, if it be not wholly and perfectly[235] bright and clean.

9. This will likewise be understood by the following comparison. A picture is truly perfect, with many and most sublime beauties and delicate and subtle illuminations, and some of its beauties are so fine and subtle that they cannot be completely realized, because of their delicacy and excellence. Fewer beauties and less delicacy will be seen in this picture by one whose vision is less clear and refined; and he whose vision is somewhat more refined will be able to see in it more beauties and perfections; and, if another person has a vision still more refined, he will see still more perfection; and, finally, he who has the clearest and purest faculties will see the most beauties and perfections of all; for there is so much to see in the picture that, however far one may attain, there will ever remain higher degrees of attainment.

10. After the same manner we may describe the condition of the soul with relation to God in this enlightenment or transformation. For, although it is true that a soul, according to its greater or lesser capacity, may have attained to union, yet not all do so in an equal degree, for this depends upon what the Lord is pleased to grant to each one. It is in this way that souls see God in Heaven; some more, some less; but all see Him, and all are content, for their capacity is satisfied.

11. Wherefore, although in this life here below we find certain souls enjoying equal peace and tranquillity in the state of perfection, and each one of them satisfied, yet some of them may be many degrees higher than others. All, however, will be equally satisfied, because the capacity of each one is satisfied. But the soul that attains not to such a measure of purity as is in conformity with its capacity never attains true peace and satisfaction, since it has not attained to the possession of that detachment and emptiness in its faculties which is required for simple union.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:02 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

April 19, 2004

Contemplation Again

Tom of Disputations says:

It might be helpful to distinguish between "living in the presence of God," where one's heart is lifted toward God even as one goes about daily life, and "ascending to God," where the soul is more or less captivated by God Himself and any awareness of daily life dims or fades away entirely.

Ascending to God is an attenuated awareness of reality? We call that psychosis, not contemplation. And yet this seems so popular a misconception of what contemplation truly is. Do we really think that the contemplative Saint has some sort of etiolated, breathless, and ethereal relationship with the world? Is the contemplative Saint a wan and otherworldly figure floating through this life just waiting for the gates of heaven to open, unaware, unseeing, unfeeling, a ghost-like wraith? That's not a saint, that's just weird.

If anything, because the contemplative saint has the right ordering of priorities and duties, and the saint that has experienced Union with God becomes God by participation (whatever that means) it would seem that they would see reality as more real. They would love things as God loves them (it would seem.) Their relationship with reality would be stronger, not weaker. They would be able to say as St. Teresa did in advising her nuns, "If you think you are having visions, perhaps you ought to eat more." They would dance in the courtyard and play tambourine. They would sit under the stars of an Andalusian night and see the splendid handiwork of God and love Him all the more for it.

Contemplation is not about breaking away from reality and creation, it is about embracing it in its right and proper order. It is about loving things with the love due them and not with disordered affection. The true contemplative lives constantly in the presence and perhaps even in the heart of God, but he is no less a human being here on Earth. Think of St. Francis among the animals, the canticle of Brother Sun and Sister Moon. This expresses the fullness of the contemplative life. We mustn't think of it as some sort of attenuation of presence in the world. It is a reification of God's love for the world. He gives us the contemplatives so that we can see what reality is all about. They are our examples of how truly to look at the world.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 5:57 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

April 18, 2004

Implications--Contemplation and the Active Life

I share the thoughts below because they have much troubled me the past several days. I have cast about for ways of saying what I would like to say and what I believe needs to be said, but this interior monologue expressed exteriorly is the best I could manage.

Tom of Disputations has stated that it is his belief that the teachings of St. John of the Cross do not comprise a universal call to holiness, that, in fact, they are really only for Carmelites and those inclined to Carmelite spirituality--not everyone is called to union nor to the contemplative life.

IF I believed that, I would have to discontinue blogging, because the only purpose to blogging is to share the NOT-EXCLUSIVELY Carmelite message of the call to Union with God. There would be no point in writing about these matters for the seven or eight Carmelites who are already on the boards, they already know this stuff as well or better than I do. I cannot say better than St. John of the Cross what he himself said.

However, I don't feel it to be true for several reasons. St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila, and St. Thérèse of Lisieux are all Doctors of the Universal Church. Not doctors of the Carmelites, not merely great sainted leaders of the Carmelites. Now, there have been a good many founders of orders who are also Doctors of the Church, but many, as well who are not. It is not the founding of an order (which Teresa and John did not do) that makes one a Doctor of the Church. It is the articulation of a universal truth of the Church recognized as such. Thus what they have to say isn't spoken merely to Carmelites, or, for that matter merely to those inclined to mystical experience. Just as what St. Thomas Aquinas has to say is not confined to Dominicans or to those inclined to the exercise of intellect in Church matters.

For example, I quote John Paul II letter on St. Thérèse of Lisieux
Divini Amoris Scientia:

In these three different manuscripts, which converge in a thematic unity and in a progressive description of her life and spiritual way, Thérèse has left us an original autobiography which is the story of her soul. It shows how in her life God has offered the world a precise message, indicating an evangelical way, the "little way", which everyone can take, because everyone is called to holiness.

In fact, St. Thérèse's teaching is a distillation of the work of St. John of the Cross. Following His direction and that of St. Teresa of Avila, the Little flower concentrated their writings into the very concise, very small, very precise "little way."

from Divini Amoris Scientia
His Holiness John Paul II

From careful study of the writings of St Thérèse of the Child Jesus and from the resonance they have had in the Church, salient aspects can be noted of her "eminent doctrine", which is the fundamental element for conferring the title of Doctor of the Church.

First of all, we find a special charism of wisdom. This young Carmelite, without any particular theological training, but illumined by the light of the Gospel, feels she is being taught by the divine Teacher who, as she says, is "the Doctor of Doctors" (Ms A, 83v), and from him she receives "divine teachings" (Ms B, 1r). She feels that the words of Scripture are fulfilled in her: "Whoever is a little one, let him come to me.... For to him that is little, mercy shall be shown" (Ms B, 1v; cf. Prv 9:4; Wis 6:6) and she knows she is being instructed in the science of love, hidden from the wise and prudent, which the divine Teacher deigned to reveal to her, as to babes (Ms A, 49r; cf. Lk 10:21-22).

Pius XI, who considered Thérèse of Lisieux the "Star of his pontificate", did not hesitate to assert in his homily on the day of her canonization, 17 May 1925: "The Spirit of truth opened and made known to her what he usually hides from the wise and prudent and reveals to little ones; thus she enjoyed such knowledge of the things above - as Our immediate Predecessor attests - that she shows everyone else the sure way of salvation" (AAS 17 [1925], p. 213).

Her teaching not only conforms to Scripture and the Catholic faith, but excels ("eminet") for the depth and wise synthesis it achieved. Her doctrine is at once a confession of the Church's faith, an experience of the Christian mystery and a way to holiness. Thérèse offers a mature synthesis of Christian spirituality: she combines theology and the spiritual life; she expresses herself with strength and authority, with a great ability to persuade and communicate, as is shown by the reception and dissemination of her message among the People of God.

Thérèse's teaching expresses with coherence and harmonious unity the dogmas of the Christian faith as a doctrine of truth and an experience of life. In this regard it should not be forgotten that the understanding of the deposit of faith transmitted by the Apostles, as the Second Vatican Council teaches, makes progress in the Church with the help of the Holy Spirit: "There is growth in insight into the realities and words that are passed on... through the contemplation and study of believers who ponder these things in their hearts (cf. Lk 2:19 and 51). It comes from the intimate sense of spiritual realities which they experience. And it comes from the preaching of those who have received, along with their right of succession in the episcopate, the sure charism of truth" (Dei Verbum, n. 8).

In the writings of Thérèse of Lisieux we do not find perhaps, as in other Doctors, a scholarly presentation of the things of God, but we can discern an enlightened witness of faith which, while accepting with trusting love God's merciful condescension and salvation in Christ, reveals the mystery and holiness of the Church.

Thus we can rightly recognize in the Saint of Lisieux the charism of a Doctor of the Church, because of the gift of the Holy Spirit she received for living and expressing her experience of faith, and because of her particular understanding of the mystery of Christ. In her are found the gifts of the new law, that is, the grace of the Holy Spirit, who manifests himself in living faith working through charity (cf. St Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theol., I-II, q. 106, art. 1; q. 108, art. 1).

We can apply to Thérèse of Lisieux what my Predecessor Paul VI said of another young Saint and Doctor of the Church, Catherine of Siena: "What strikes us most about the Saint is her infused wisdom, that is to say, her lucid, profound and inebriating absorption of the divine truths and mysteries of faith.... That assimilation was certainly favoured by the most singular natural gifts, but it was also evidently something prodigious, due to a charism of wisdom from the Holy Spirit" (AAS 62 [1970], p. 675).

8. With her distinctive doctrine and unmistakable style, Thérèse appears as an authentic teacher of faith and the Christian life. In her writings, as in the sayings of the Holy Fathers, is found that lifegiving presence of Catholic tradition whose riches, as the Second Vatican Council again says, "are poured out in the practice and life of the Church, in her belief and prayer" (Dei Verbum, n. 8).

If considered in its literary genre, corresponding to her education and culture, and if evaluated according to the particular circumstances of her era, the doctrine of Thérèse of Lisieux appears in providential harmony with the Church's most authentic tradition, both for its confession of the Catholic faith and for its promotion of the most genuine spiritual life, presented to all the faithful in a living, accessible language. . . .

10. The spiritual doctrine of Thérèse of Lisieux has helped extend the kingdom of God. By her example of holiness, of perfect fidelity to Mother Church, of full communion with the See of Peter, as well as by the special graces obtained by her for many missionary brothers and sisters, she has rendered a particular service to the renewed proclamation and experience of Christ's Gospel and to the extension of the Catholic faith in every nation on earth.

There is no need to dwell at length on the universality of Thérèse's doctrine and on the broad reception of her message during the century since her death: it has been well documented in the studies made in view of conferring on her the title of Doctor of the Church.

A particularly important fact in this regard is that the Church's Magisterium has not only recognized Thérèse's holiness, but has also highlighted the wisdom of her doctrine. Pius X had already said that she was "the greatest saint of modern times". On joyfully receiving the first Italian edition of the Story of a Soul, he extolled the fruits that had resulted from Thérèse's spirituality. Benedict XV, on the occasion of proclaiming the Servant of God's heroic virtues, explained the way of spiritual childhood and praised the knowledge of divine realities which God granted to Thérèse in order to teach others the ways of salvation (cf. AAS 13 [1921], pp. 449-452). On the occasion of both her beatification and canonization, Pius XI wished to expound and recommend the Saint's doctrine, underscoring her special divine enlightenment (Discorsi di Pio XI, vol. I, Turin 1959, p. 91) and describing her as a teacher of life (cf. AAS 17 [1925], pp. 211-214). When the Basilica of Lisieux was consecrated in 1954, Pius XII said, among other things, that Thérèse penetrated to the very heart of the Gospel with her doctrine (cf. AAS 46 [1954], pp. 404-408). Cardinal Angelo Roncalli, the future Pope John XXIII, visited Lisieux several times, especially when he was Nuncio in Paris. On various occasions during his pontificate he showed his devotion to the Saint and explained the relationship between the doctrine of the Saint of Avila and her daughter, Thérèse of Lisieux (Discorsi, Messaggi, Colloqui, vol. II [1959-1960], pp. 771-772). Many times during the celebration of the Second Vatican Council, the Fathers recalled her example and doctrine. On the centenary of her birth, Paul VI addressed a Letter on 2 January 1973 to the Bishop of Bayeux and Lisieux, in which he extolled Thérèse's example in the search for God, offered her as a teacher of prayer and theological virtue of hope, and a model of communion with the Church, calling the attention of teachers, educators, pastors and theologians themselves to the study of her doctrine (cf. AAS 65 [1973], pp. 12-15). I myself on various occasions have had the joy of recalling the person and doctrine of the Saint, especially during my unforgettable visit to Lisieux on 2 June 1980, when I wished to remind everyone: "One can say with conviction about Thérèse of Lisieux that the Spirit of God allowed her heart to reveal directly to the people of our time the fundamental mystery, the reality of the Gospel.... Her 'little way' is the way of 'holy childhood'. There is something unique in this way, the genius of St Thérèse of Lisieux. At the same time there is the confirmation and renewal of the most basic and most universal truth. What truth of the Gospel message is really more basic and more universal than this: God is our Father and we are his children?" (Insegnamenti di Giovanni Paolo II, vol. III/1 [1980], p. 1659).

These simple references to an uninterrupted series of testimonies from the Popes of this century on the holiness and doctrine of St Thérèse of the Child Jesus and to the universal dissemination of her message clearly express to what extent the Church, in her pastors and her faithful, has accepted the spiritual doctrine of this young Saint.

A sign of the ecclesial reception of the Saint's teaching is the appeal to her doctrine in many documents of the Church's ordinary Magisterium, especially when speaking of the contemplative and missionary vocation, of trust in the just and merciful God, of Christian joy and of the call to holiness. Evidence of this fact is the presence of her doctrine in the recent Catechism of the Catholic Church (nn. 127, 826, 956, 1011, 2011, 2558). She who so loved to learn the truths of the faith in the catechism deserved to be included among the authoritative witnesses of Catholic doctrine.

Thérèse possesses an exceptional universality. Her person, the Gospel message of the "little way" of trust and spiritual childhood have received and continue to receive a remarkable welcome, which has transcended every border.

The influence of her message extends first of all to men and women whose holiness and heroic virtues the Church herself has recognized, to the Church's pastors, to experts in theology and spirituality, to priests and seminarians, to men and women religious, to ecclesial movements and new communities, to men and women of every condition and every continent. To everyone Thérèse gives her personal confirmation that the Christian mystery, whose witness and apostle she became by making herself in prayer "the apostle of the apostles", as she boldly calls herself (Ms A, 56r), must be taken literally, with the greatest possible realism, because it has a value for every time and place. The power of her message lies in its concrete explanation of how all Jesus' promises are fulfilled in the believer who knows how confidently to welcome in his own life the saving presence of the Redeemer.

I'm sorry to quote at such length, but I think it is time to put this whole question to rest. There can be no question that John Paul II and one assumes much of the Church from the time of the Saint's beatification has regarded here doctrine as sound and universal and her doctrine is nothing other than that handed down from the Bible and from the riches of her mother and father in faith, St. Teresa and St. John of the Cross.

Regarding St. John of the Cross, another opinion supporting my own from Doctors of the Church.

John's words are for all creatures and especially members of the Church. They do not have to live in monasteries or secluded settings or be contemplative. For John, God wants to transform each and everyone regardless of their lifestyle. All have to give the payback. We are "bandits". Intentionally or unintentionally we keep or are stingy with God who wants our loving thoughts, feelings, aspirations and desperations. John understood that to give up these for God results in a giving back to Him. John always reminds us that love is only repaid by love alone. We are spiritual thieves. We have imprisoned the Word made Flesh in God's many sanctuaries. God is more entrapped by His love for us than by our "stealing" him away from the celestial court. The kingdom of the heavenly court dwells in our midst, mystically and physically. Faith and love grasp this truth.

There is a mystic in each of us. It's God dwelling in us in a marvelous and invisible manner. God is absolute Mystery. God told Moses "I am who I am" One can not say more about God's presence than what God told Moses. The mystical apostle, St John, described God's nature: God is love. The mystical doctor's message is where there is no love, put love and you will find love. He was absolutely convinced that nothing is obtained from God except through love.

(I apologize that I was unable to find the document of Pius XI declaring him a Doctor of the Universal Church.

In my opinion, the fact that St. John of the Cross was a Carmelite in no way narrows the scope of his advise merely to those who are Carmelite. He is a teacher of the Universal Church--not without flaw or error, but certainly on a par with other Doctors of the Church. Just as St. Francis, St. Francis de Sales, St. Thomas Aquinas, and all of the great saints are not teachers of one small sector of the Church alone, neither is St. John of the Cross. One need not be Carmelite to heed his advice. Moreover, John of the Cross can be viewed simply as a synthesist of Doctrine up to his time. Finally, John spent more time as a director than as a teacher. Much of his teaching is really about teaching one to understand where one is on the spiritual path. He did very little direct teaching about a "method" or a "mode" of praying--he simply marked the path and told us how to recognize signs that tell us we need to progress and move on.

So I don't think the blog is in any danger. I stand on firm ground when I categorically state that St. John's teaching, like St. Therese's and St. Teresa's and St. Catherine of Siena is meant for all. If one chooses not to follow it, that is one's own business, but to suggest that because one does not choose to follow it, it necessarily follows that the teaching is not for all is, in my opinion and the opinion of a great many others whose thought means a great deal more than my own, erroneous. St. John advises all of us, Carmelites and Catholics of no order. What he has to say is not for a select few, the "chosen" or the called. Nor is meant only for the Carmelite order. This, in point of fact, is part of what is meant when one is declared a Doctor of the Universal Church. To object that his saying is difficult and therefore not required of us can be legitimately compared (in a far lesser degree) to stating that Jesus' teaching is hard and therefore not required of us. Truly St. John's teaching is not a requirement of salvation (whereas Jesus’ is); however, the difficulty it presents in no way abrogates its efficacy in achieving a life of holiness.

Are there other ways to do the same thing? Perhaps, but they all come to the same thing: "Sell all you have, give it to the poor, and then come follow me." "You cannot serve God and Mammon" (or God and Venus, or God and Ceres, or God and Nature, or God and . . .) it is God alone. This is the core of the doctrine of St. John of the Cross and his call to contemplation and union is meant for all, either now, or in the life to come. There is no getting around it. The vocation of Christian life is perfection in charity that can only come about through stripping oneself (through grace and the Holy Spirit) from all attachments to things less than God. Hard, but true, and stated time and again in the teaching of the Church from the lips of Jesus to the present day.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:02 PM | Comments (8) | TrackBack

April 13, 2004

A Correspondent with Fr. G-L Offers Some Thoughts

Father Lagrange's book is one of those in which the footnotes occasionally exceed the length of the text above. And in a passage regarding how to find union with God, we find this remarkable excerpt from a letter:

from Christian Perfection and Contemplation
Fr. Reginald Garrigou Lagrange O.P.

[here quoting an anonymous Novice mistress]

". . . In my opinion, many souls remain at the door of the true life because they lack instruction and are deluded in believing that meditation alone is a sure state. Ordinarily when one enters our monasteries with the required dispositions. . . and when one strives seriously to acquire the virtues, the soul is, in a very short time, subjected by God to aridity and powerlessness, the prelude of the passive purifications. It is almost impossible to make those who have been trained according to the method of reasoned meditation believe that this state is good, and that it is made to lead them to the divine union. They do not understand the teaching of St. John of the Cross: 'To apply oneself at this time to the comprehension and consideration of particular objects, were they ever so spiritual, would be to place an obstacle int he way of the general, subtle, and simple light of the spirit.; it would be to overcloud one's spirit. . . .'

"Those who cling to meditation are still waiting after thirty years and more of religious life for someone to lift them up and show them what they are still seeking. They lead a colorless and dull spiritual life. In the contemplative life the secret of happiness is in knowng how to live this life under the eye of God.. . .

Every soul that is even slightly contemplative, instinctively seeks to rid itself of everything personal and places no value on it. . . ."

I have three reasons for quoting this passage. The first is to show that spiritual direction is almost essential at some point along the way. Perhaps one can struggle through much of the experience by oneself, but eventually there comes a time when one requires help to man the rudder and keep the ship on course.

The second is to note that the contemplative life seems to come very rapidly (to the cloistered) who have the proper disposition and desire. I think this extends to the lay life, but perhaps requires more time given that one has other repsonsibilities and vocations to attend to. Persons who are married and who have children have a primary responsibility to their spouses and children. This is their primary vocation and one better "achieves perfection" through obedience to the necessity of one's calling than through all the straining at the bit with concomittant neglect of one's spouse and child. Obedience and humility seem to be virtues very highly prized by God, possibly because they foster a greater life of charity. Thus, in the married state, one sacrifices to some extent, what one would rather do (direct ascent to God) to what one is required (and in my case, at least, priveleged and overjoyed) to do. So those attending to families should feel no remorse at this temporary delay. The prayer of responsibly iiving out one's vocation will ultimately further union when the time comes.

The third reason for quoting the passage is in the last sentence. It seems natural and right that the contemplative soul, the soul seeking constant communion and communication with God, would naturally move toward shedding the obstacles that stand in the way of that Union. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange goes through a great deal of effort to show that this has been the teaching from St. Paul on; that St. John of the Cross is perhaps a more precise articulator of the mechanisms and the meanings of some of the stages of prayer, but that the doctrine springs from the wells of Sacred Scripture itself, and thus, ultimately the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. I find this interesting to reflect upon because it verifies my own observations regarding this. And it seems to be true of every Christian tradition.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:53 AM | Comments (7) | TrackBack

April 12, 2004

Father Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. on the Teachings of St. John of the Cross

from Christian Perfection and Contemplation
Father Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange

We shall demonstrate that this doctrine of St. John of the Cross, [concerning the unitive way as uniate and the perfection of Christian Charity, hence the destination of all Christians] while clarifying that of the great doctors who preceded him, remains perfectly conformable to their teaching, and that it is contained in the evangelical beatitudes. These propose to us Christian perfection in all its grandeur, and are certainly not inferior in elevation to what the author of The Spiritual Canticle has written. . . .

Is a special vocation necessary to reach the mystical life? In principle no. "The grace of the virtues and of the gifts" suffices in itself by its normal development to dispose us to the mystical life, and mystical contemplation is necessary for the full perfection of Christian life. But in fact, for lack of certain condo\itions which at times are independent of our will, even generous souls would attain contemplation only after a longer space of time than the ordinary span of life; just as some minds, which are capable of a superior intellectual development, never reach it for lack of certain conditions.

Now, it remains to be seen if Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange actually accomplishes what he sets out to do; however, his evidences thus far have been persuasive, if not conclusive.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:17 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

April 8, 2004

Rejecting the Extraordinary

from The Science of the Cross
St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein)

The darkness that leads to God is, as we already know, faith. It is the only means that leads to union because it sets God before our eyes as he is: as infinite, as triune. Faith resembles God in that both blind the intellect and appear to it as darkness. "The greater one's faith the closer is one's union with God." Its darkness is indicated in sacred Scripture by the image of the cloud, in which God concealed himself in the Old Testament revelations: to Moses on the mount, in Solomon's temple. The light of truth is concealed in this darkness. It will "at once appear when faith reaches its end. . . by the ending of this mortal life."

Temporarily, though, we are totally dependent on faith. What it gives us -- contemplation-- is a dark and general knowledge; it stands in contrast not only to natural cognition but also to the various ways in which the intellect receives distinct and particular supernatural knowledge: visions, revelations, locutions, and spiritual feelings. The bodily eyes may be shown images and person from the other world: angels or saints, or unusual shining lights. One can hear extraordinary words, smell the sweetest fragrances, savor exquisite tastes, or feel extreme delight through the sense of touch. A person should refuse to attend to this, without seeking to examine whether it is good or bad. To be sure these things may come from God but there is no certainty about that. "God's self-communication is more appropriately given to the spirit than to the senses, and the soul finds greater security and make greater progress for through what is received by the sense, as a rule, great danger of deception exists. For the senses then believe they can arbitrate and judge spiritual matters, whereas they are as ignorant of them as a beast of burden is of rational matters."

Two points here: first, the image of the cloud occurs throughout all of mystical literature. One of the great early classics of English Spirituality is called The Cloud of Unknowing. This is a common inheritance.

Second: while God communicates to the soul all that the soul needs, because we are integrated creatures there is some fall-out perceived by the senses. That is, one may have visions or other extraordinary manifestations of what God is doing within. The best practice and soundest policy is to ignore the extraordinary without considering for a moment whether it is a sign of good or bad. Let go of it, let it slip by. The only important thing is continual focus on and ardent love of God. All of these things are extraneous, potential distractions; indeed, they are potential derailers of all the good that has come thus far. If one follows the senses and pays attention to these things as they occur, one strays once again from the giver and ends up pursuing the gift. The gift, as magnificent as it may be, is always less than the giver. The gift is merely a means to an end (or sometimes even less--a sign of the means), the Giver Himself is the end.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:34 AM | TrackBack

April 5, 2004

Is Saint John of the Cross for Everyone?: Garrigou-Lagrange on the Mystical Life

As it is probably more profitable for a Dominican to address a Dominican's concerns; and, as those concerns pertain to us all, it seems wise to take a look at what Garrigou-Lagrange has to say about the mystical life in general and ultimately about St. John of the Cross. Throughout the bolded emphases are mine.

from Christian Perfection and Contemplation
Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange

We shall note two important consequence of this doctrine.

1) Since sanctifying grace is the beginning of eternal life and since every just soul enjoys habitual union with the Blessed Trinity dwelling in it, the mystical union, or the actual, intimate, and almost continual union with God, such as is found here on earth in holy souls appears as the culminating point on earth of the development of the grace of the virtues and of the gifts and as the normal, even though rather infrequent, prelude to the life of heaven. This mystical union belongs, in fact to the order of sanctifying grace; it proceeds essentially from "the grace of the virtues and of the gifts" and not from graces gratis datae, which are transitory and in a sense exterior (as miracles and prophecy) and which may accompany it. The mystical life is Christian life, which has, so to speak, become conscious of itself. It does not give us the absolute certainty that we are in the state of grace, a certitude which, according to the Council of Trent, would presuppose a special revelation, but as St. Paul says: "The Spirit Himself giveth testimony to our spirit, that we are the sons of God." He makes us know this, observes St. Thomas, "by the filial love which He produces in us."

2) As the life of grace is essentially ordained to that of glory, the normal, although in fact quite rare, summit of its development should be a very perfect disposition to receive the light of glory immediately after death without passing through purgatory; for it is only through our own fault that we will be detained in that place of expiation, where the soul can no longer merit. Now this very perfect disposition to immediate glorification can be nothing other than an intense charity coupled with the ardent desire of the beatific vision, such as we find them particularly in the transforming union, after the painful passive purifications which have delivered the soul from its blemishes. Since nothing unclean can enter heaven, in principle a soul must undergo these passive purifications at least in a measure before death while meriting and progressing, or after death without meriting or progressing.

These consequences to which we will return, disclose the grandeur of the Christian perfection which can be realized on earth, and they contain the loftiest and most practical teaching. (p. 127-129)

Now, it would seem if we were not all called to perfection, this doctrine would be lofty, but certainly not practical. Nor, it would seem would the "normal, though quite rare summit" would be the direct ascent into Heaven. By normal, one would postulate that this is the way things are supposed to occur. If so, then it would seem that Christians are called to operate in such a way as this would be the normal and less that quite rare result of a Christian life.

Lagrange will go on in the work.

from Christian Perfection and Contemplation
Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange

As regards the word "call" or "vocation," we will attempt to distinguish in this work the different meanings it may have according as it concerns a general and remote call of all just souls to mystical contemplation or, on the contrary, an individual and proximate call. (p. 46)

One final note:

from Christian Perfection and Contemplation
Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange

Therefore it seems certain that the mystical life, characterized by the predominance of the gifts of the holy Ghost is required for the full perfection of the Christian life. Is this likewise true of mystical contemplation, properly so called?. . . As we have already stated, the gifts of contemplation may as yet intervene in these souls only in a diffuse manner; the mystical life is still imperfect in them. It may be accompanied by a great generosity, which merits the name of perfection without, however, being the full perfection of the Christian life. (p. 367)

The saint [Teresa of Jesus] says in chapter 21 [of The Way of Perfection]: "I maintain that this is the chief point; in fact, the everything depends on their having a great and a most resolute determination never to halt until they reach their journey's end, happen what may, whatever the consequence are, cost what it will, let who will blame them. . . whether the Earth itself goes to pieces beneath their feet." The general call of souls to mystical life could not be more clearly affirmed. (p. 371)

Now, none of this establishes that all souls are called to one order; however, they are all called to the same end--attain it however they may. But it seems that St. Thomas Aquinas and a great many others bear out the words of St. John of the Cross regarding the steps necessary to attaining Christian Perfection and that the attainment of Christian Perfection is a necessary part of the beatific vision and that we are all called to this in our lives here on Earth; however, very few of us answer that call.

Now I am at an end of saying whether or not what St. John of the Cross teaches is for everyone. I believe that it is so. That the path marked up to the summit of Mount Carmel is the path that everyone will eventually tread even if they follow other means to do so and even if such treading is actually being dragged after death up the slopes through the good works and prayers for those left behind. The Ascent of Mount Carmel seems to be a necessary and universal part of Christian life (according to the teaching of the Saints). The only question is whether or not St. John's way is the only way. And my answer there is that I do not know. I assume that it is not, and yet I cannot know because I have read of no other means of ascent, which is negative evidence. It means only that I have not yet encountered anything that suggests another substantially different way.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:54 AM | TrackBack

April 3, 2004

Praying Constantly

Tom expresses some legitimate concern that from the Dominican point of view it may seem as if Carmelites get too wrapped up in the extraordinary experiential aspects of prayer.

I can see how that might occur. I can also say that there is as little to be done about the concern as there is about the equally legitimate concern that arguments of St. Thomas Aquinas on "quickening" are frequently used by supporters of abortion both within and outside of the Church. Some Carmelites may well be caught up in the problem sited; however, St. John of the Cross, and the other sainted Carmelites were not among them.

John's seeming obsession about the experiential aspects of prayer stems from the fact that he was writing many of his works as spiritual guidebooks. He was identifying for many the roadsigns along the path of prayer that indicated the times to stand pat and the times to move on. Naturally his focus would be on the experiential aspects of the prayer life.

However, these guidebooks stemmed from his true statements about the spiritual life, his poetry. And his poetry is a series of lovesongs of the soul for God. These are not about extraordinary prayer (although John uses them as launching pads for his teaching), they are about simple acts of love and living in the abiding presence of the beloved.

Thus much of his work stems from poetry. The language is likely to be overblown, fanciful, or metaphorical. Tom particularly questioned my use of the expression "experiencing heaven on Earth," which will obviously mean different things to different people, depending on their image of heaven. He asks whether this is the goal of everyone or even the proper goal of a Carmelite. And it is a legitimate question. I answer it by saying that the way i see "experiencing Heaven on Earth" might be described in the simpler phrase of Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection--"the practice of the presence of God." For me, the experience of heaven on Earth is to abide in the presence of God all the time. As St. Paul tells us, "to pray constantly." Not to pray in an overt prayer that sounds like a prayer, but to pray in the way Mother Teresa did--in acts of service to the poor, to the oppressed, to the voiceless, and in acts of actual prayer, such as the Mass, and Eucharistic Adoration, and the Rosay, and in acts of showering and even sleeping. To make prayer so much an ordinary part of every day that no action can really be separated from it. I have not achieved this goal--but to my mind this is what all the talk about extraordinary states and manifestations is about. It is about knowing that the God who loves me intensely is with me every step of the way and it is about living as though I really believe that. It is about life becoming prayer, not about prayer (in any one form or another) becoming life.

This still probably doesn't alleviate the misunderstandings that are possible, but for that I would suggest consulting Garrigou-Lagrange and allowing a Dominican to explain the Carmelites to another Domincan. Therese--thanks so much for the book, I never knew how handy it would be.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 2:35 PM | TrackBack

April 2, 2004

The Meaning of the Dark Night of the Senses

One must wonder what the purpose of this detachment is, why go through this dark night? Why subject yourself to the terrible provisions of detachment?

from The Science of the Cross
St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross

In the beginning this being inflamed in love is not commonly perceived. The soul feels rather only dryness and emptiness, sorrowful fear and concern. And if she does feel any of the love, it is as a painful yearning for God, a smarting wound of love. Only later will she recognize that God has purified her through the night of the senses and wished to make the senses subject to the spirit. The she will exclaim: "Oh happy fate!" And she will clearly see what gain the "unnoticed esacpe" means for her: it has freed her from the servitude in which the sense had kept her, and little by little she is detached from all creatures and attracted to eternal goods. The night of the senses was for her the narrow gate (Mt 7:14) that leads to life.

Nothing more need be said. While we live it, we do not know how enslaved we are to our senses. When our love of God is greater than our love of His Creation, we will be led toward Him and through His grace and mercy we can undergo this purification that allows the senses to become subordinate to the spirit. We will finally see clearly.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:26 AM | TrackBack

"Not Creating It to Be a Waste. . ."

For thus says the Lord,
the creator of the heavens,
who is God,
the designer and maker of the earth
who established it,
not creating it to be a waste,
but designing it to be lived in. (Isaiah 45: 18)

For thus saith the LORD that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I am the LORD; and there is none else.

I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth: I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain: I the LORD speak righteousness, I declare things that are right. (Isaiah 45: 18-19)

I thought a pause in our headlong rush through St. Teresa Benedicta and St. John of the Cross was called for. A momentary pause, or to quote the poet:

A Moment's Halt--a momentary taste
Of Being from the Well amid the Waste--
And Lo!--the phantom Caravan has reach'd
The Nothing it set out from--Oh, make haste!

The purpose of the pause is to clarify what St. John of the Cross teaches and what he does not. This was inspired by an e-mail exchange with a friend in which the friend brought up some points I thought he might have inferred from reading these posts. It turns out rather that he got them from a mission given by Opus Dei priests in his community. Here is his summary of impressions:

For example, the priest last night kept talking about finding ways to make ourselves more uncomfortable, to constantly deny ourselves even basic needs, such as a glass of water when we're thirsty (the priest even make a crack about people who constantly carry around what he called "baby bottles", to ensure that they're never without water), in order to please God. This is why I made the comment I did about fasting until my prayers are answered: if we're called upon to actively cause ourselves pain, then there can be no end to it until we die. Escriva sounds to me like a modern day flagellant. The priest even mentioned that he would try not to see the beautiful, which you counseled against, by averting his eyes when riding through a countryside.

[here follows an excerpt of my reply]
I find the view you describe repugnant, Jansenistic, and very nearly manichean. It suggests a hatred of physicality that is unhealthy. . .I'd like to talk about what St. Teresa Benedicta and St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avila were NOT talking about, and what you describe is precisely it. I think if you view it in the way St. John of the Cross does you find a much more faithful way of approaching creation. We do need to mortify the senses by choosing the less appealing rather than the more appealing, but we needn't shut our eyes to the glory through which God speaks to us. That strikes me as just short of sinful--a denial of the [essential] goodness in creation.

As much as I respect the works of Josemaria Escriva and other followers of the Opus Dei prefecture, I've always been a bit cautious regarding their personal approaches to the world. If this priest represents mainline Opus Dei teaching, then indeed caution is called for. I rather hope he expresses extremes of the view. The reason for this is that it strikes me that such suggestions and actions come very close to blasphemy.

The Lord made the world and made it good. He made it to be a world to be lived in. And throughout all creation is the imprint of the Maker. His signature can be found everywhere in nature--in running streams, in sweet grapes, in the scent of orange blossoms or the sea, in the touch of spring-warm breeze, in sunsets, in the sound of the wind in the trees, etc. The Franciscans were well aware that the glories of the Creator were signs of Him and means of access.

To go out of one's way to deny oneself basic needs, to make oneself miserable in the world redounds to whose glory? It is one thing to undertake basic mortifications (the fast prescribed by the church, or such small fasts as we are called to make in the world) but to deliberately shut your eyes so that you cannot see the glories of creations. While this is a severe mortification, if also approaches Manicheeism. It seems to suggest that there is something wrong with participation in the world. And what I quotes from Isaiah above indicates clearly what the Lord thinks about the world--He made it to be lived in, not fled from. We are not called to make ourselves miserable or full of pain. The world will do enough of that for us, and when it happens, we are called to joyfully accept it. However, why go looking for trouble--living presents enough pain and suffering as it is?

No, it strikes me as foolish not to acknowledge what is around you. I don't think the good Lord calls us to make ourselves hurt every day as some sort of memorial to him. In fact, elsewhere in Isaiah don't we hear about the kind of fast the Lord wants?

5 Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his soul? is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the LORD?
6 Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke?
7 Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?
8 Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the LORD shall be thy rearward.

(Isaiah 58:5-8, KJV--sorry Bible Gateway doesn't offer Douay Rheims)

There, the Lord speaks through His own prophet saying we should feed the hungry. Well, why should we do that if the Lord wants us all to suffer for Him? Wouldn't it be far wiser to leave them to be hungry because they are already suffering? So too with the yoke of oppression--why throw it off? Just let those who are under oppression throw it off. In fact, if we take the doctrine above to an extreme, we could say that it is our duty to oppress so that there can be greater suffering for all.

Nonsense. This seems, as I said, at best suspect, and at worst something that should be suppressed. I have no interest in administering "the discipline." I have no desire to return to the glory days of mortifications unto sickness.

Nor do the Carmelite Saints. St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Thérèse, St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross do not teach this and roundly teach against it. Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity said that if we suffer and can find some alleviation from it, then it is right to do so; but if the suffering is irremediable, we should accept it gladly and unite it for the betterment of all to the sufferings of Jesus on the Cross.

Carmelite teaching is not that the things of the world are bad, but, in fact that they are so good we tend to want them too much. We need to mortify the senses. And by that I believe St. John to mean that we must not seek out sensation, not that we are to blind and deafen ourselves, but that we are to accept the things of the world without taking delight in them. That is to say, we don't seek to linger in the sensation, but we let them pass on by and we continue our pursuit of the path of God. We don't deliberately not look, but we also don't seek to look. This is a world apart from deliberately not looking at God's glorious creation. It may seem subtle, but it makes all the difference in the world.

To be fair to Opus Dei, I've never seen any hint in the writings that we are called to make ourselves miserable. St. Josemaria is said to have administered the discipline frequently, but I don't know if that is the rumor of detractors or what it really means. Nor does it mean we are necessarily to follow his example. Saints can be unhinged and still be Saints--St. Dymphna comes to mind, as do certain actions of St. Rose of Lima (quicklime on the face and broken glass to mar her beauty and prevent vanity). And I do believe that the deliberate infliction of inordinate pain is a sign of illness, not of health in mind and body. A fast, a small mortification, fine; but to daily seek to live a life of misery and pain--that is a definition of mental illness and you can find it clearly delineated in the diagnostic manual.

We need to remember St. Teresa of Avila danced with her nuns at recreation and played tambourine. St. John of the Cross is said to have dearly loved the scenic vistas of Medina del Campo and the Spanish Countryside. Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity was a master pianist, awarded a number of awards at her school. St. Thérèse's sister was an accomplished photographer. John Henry Newman an accomplished poet. These are all joys and creations of the world, and so long as we do not make them the end-all be-all of existence, participation in them and delight in them is a good thing. We learn again about God.

So, lest there were any apprehension about what one is called to in the Carmelite way, I thought I would make this clear distinction. It is one thing to "see without seeing" it is another to deny yourself water because you can suffer more. As Christine said elsewhere, the call to suffering is a gift of the Lord that not all receive and I don't think it should be considered a universal salutary practice. The acceptance of such suffering as comes (and cannot be avoided) with equanimity and with joy, on the other hand, is a practice that leads to wholeness.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:12 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

April 1, 2004

Dying to Self--(Continued)

From St. Teresa Benedicta, again. (Please, restrain the applause, the wild hoots of enthusiasm, I only do my humble best as does she.)

from The Science of the Cross
St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross

The peace God produces in the spirit through the dryness of the sensory being is "spiritual and most precious" and its "fruit is quiet, delicate, solitary, satisfying, and peaceful, and far removed from all earlier gratifications which were more palpable and sensory." So one understands that only the dying of the sensory being is felt and nothing is experienced of the beginning of the new life that is concealed beneath it.

It is no exaggeration when we call the suffering of the souls in this state a crucifixion. In their inability to make use of their own faculties they are as though nailed fast. And to the dryness is added the torment of fear that they are on the wrong path. "The live in the belief that they will have no more spiritual blessing and that God has abandoned them." Then they strive to act in the former manner, but as unable to achieve anything and only disturb the peace that God is working in them.

They should do absolutely nothing other than "perservere patiently in prayer without any activity whatsoever; all that is required of them here is freedom of soul, that they liberate themselves from the impediment and fatigue of ideas and thoughts, and care not about thinking and meditating. They must be content simply with a loving and peaceful attentiveness to God, and live without the concern, without the effort, and without the desire to taste or feel him." Instead of doing this, because they lack competent guidance, they strive in vain, and possibly plague themselves with the thought that they are only wasting time with their prayer and ought to give it up.

Were they to remain peacefully surrendered to this dark contemplation they would soon experience what the second line of the song of the Night calls the inflaming love. "For contemplation is nothing else than a secret and peaceful loving inflow of God, which, if not hampered, fires the soul in the spirit of love."

There you have it. That's where I want to be. That is what I long for, what I desire above all desires. And, of course, that is part of the problem, because the process of detachment means that I must learn not to desire this in order to attain it. I long for union with God and a loving, intimate living with Him, and if I wait upon Him without longing, then it will be happen. But so long as I seek the consolations of His presence the sweet delight of intimacy, I can know nothing other than my own desire. Our desires blind us to God's will. This is the theme St. John and St. Teresa Benedicta continually center around. We must come to terms with our desires, slay them and remain faithful and true servants of Our Lord. Only in this is the path up Mt. Carmel and the presence of heaven on Earth. But to get there we must pass through Earthly purgatory (only possible with His grace and help.) But such is our goal and to achieve it, we should set our hearts not on the goal, but on loving Jesus and proclaiming the love of Jesus throughout the world. This love comes at a cost. People are frightened of it. Witness the lack of comments regarding this--and yet I know that people are visiting. I do not lament the silence, but I cherish it, because I believe it means that the words are sinking in, and they are hard. Hard words are frightening and there isn't much to say about them. So I accept what is not said as a tribute to the Truth of them. God is good.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:29 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

March 31, 2004

"Who Would Save Their Life Must Lose It"

"Deliver us from evil,
--and from slavery to the senses, which blinds us to goodness."
(from the intercessions of Morning Prayer--Wednesday 5th Week of Lent)

How providential that our subject from St. Teresa Benedicta this morning is presaged by the intercession from morning prayer.

We don't like to face the truth of Jesus’ dictum, but it is important for us to do so. "For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it " (Matthew 16:25). In short, we can't do it ourselves. Moreover, we should not expect it to be either easy or without unpleasantness--dying isn't a particularly easy process. But dying to self is critically necessary for advancing in real life.

from The Science of the Cross
St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (and St. John of the Cross)

To take up battle against it [the animal spirit] , or to take one's cross upon oneself, means entering into the dark night actively. The saint [John of the Cross] gives several concise directions of which he himself says: "A person who sincerely wants to practice them will need no others since all the others are include in these." These directions are:

"1) Sustain always the desire to imitate Christ in all things and to bring your life into conformity with his. You must therefore study his life in order to imitate it and behave always as he would.

"2) In order to do this well, you must deny yourself every pleasure that presents itself to your senses, keep it far from you if it is not solely directed to the honor and glory of God.

"And in fact you should do this out of love for Jesus who knew no other joy and had no desire in his life other than to fulfill the will of his Father. He called this his food and nourishment [Jn 4:34]. If, for instance, some amusement offers itself to you in hearing of things that do not contribute to the service of God, then you should neither have pleasure in them nor wish to hear them. . . . Likewise, practice renunciation in regard to all your sense for as much as you are able to refuse their impressions readily. Insofar as you are unable to ward them off, it is sufficient that you take no enjoyment when these things approach you. Take care how you mortify your senses and preserve them from being touched by any inordinate desire. Then they will remain alike in darkness and in short time you will make great progress."

"The follow maxims will serve as a thoroughly effective means of mortification and harmoniously ordering the four natural passions: joy, hope, fear, and sorrow. . . . Take care that your inclination is ever directed:

not toward the easier, but toward the more difficult;
not toward the pleasant, but toward the unpleasant;
not toward the restful, but toward the troublesome;
not toward the more, but toward the less;
not toward what brings you more joy, but what brings displeasure;
not toward what prepares consolation for you, but toward what makes you disconsolate;
not toward the higher and more valuable, but toward the lowly and insignificant;
not toward what wants to be something, but toward what wants to be nothing."

. . . No further explanation is necessary to see that this active entry into the dark night of the sense is synonymous with ready willingness to take up the cross, and with persistence in carrying the cross. But one does not die from carrying the cross. And in order to pass completely through the night, a person must die to sin. One can deliver oneself up to crucifixion, but one cannot crucify oneself. Therefore that which the active night has begun must be completed by the passive night, that is, through God himself.

Always remembering that passing through either night is only possible with the generous assistance of Grace.

We don't like to think about these things. We would prefer to squeak into heaven, on a technicality if necessary. Who really wants to die to self--to give up the pleasures of the world, to not find joy in the little things that are around us? But I look at the lives of the Saints who chose to do this and fact of the matter is, their lives were filled constantly with a far greater joy than I can summon up from any created thing (except, perhaps, Samuel--but that's another matter.)

We don't want to do the work of sacrifice. We'll give money, we'll look to buy our way out of real self-giving, but it isn't sufficient. To truly serve God and to claim His greatest gifts for us we must die to self. There is no compromise. If we are to live the life God has for us we must abandon the one by which we protect ourselves from God's agency. We must shed the self-created life and assume the one that God has had for us from the beginning. It will either happen here on Earth or in the life to come. But it will happen. It seems to me that I would rather choose the joys the Saints partook of than the ones that I have daily, the ones that more and more taste of dust and ashes. The joys of eternity are available to us but we must be open to receive them and to receive them, we must love God more than we love ourselves. Loving God is the only thing that makes entry into the active dark night possible. We cannot do it by will, though we might start. We cannot do it by our own power, though we must contribute to it. We cannot do it without grace. And even with grace, if we do not allow grace to feed and fan the fires of love we cannot do it. Only love can draw one through the dark night. God's intense love for us is the magnet and our love for Him must transcend all earthly loves (even while it incorporates a great many of them). If we do not love God most of all, we cannot enter into the night, our strength and our courage will fail. And God wants us to enter this night so He can share how much, how intensely, how completely He Loves us. We cannot know this while senses are dulled by all the glittering attractions of the world. We must abandon our love of it (even as we continue to live in it) and direct all of our devotion and attention to God. In this we purify the senses, and like John of the Cross we will begin to truly love the vistas of creation, not for creation itself but for and by intense love of our creator. Our eyes begin to see what is really there, our ears to hear, our sense to actually touch. The weariness of the world washes away from them and we, like Lazarus are called out of the tomb into the real world--the world "charged with the Glory of God." That is our goal, that is ultimately our destiny. Why would we want to put it off until later? Why would we choose a lesser love over a greater?

But if we would choose this greater way, it will be hard to walk because of our fallen nature. Nevertheless, I, for one, want to open myself to God's call and to find Him here and now. I want to walk in the Garden in the evening and to be reborn into His image of me. He dreamed me into existence from the beginning of time, I want to fulfill His dream. I want to realize His dream for me.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:07 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

March 30, 2004

Hard Words for Hard Times

Oh, you didn't think you got away from St. Teresa Benedicta so easily did you? Thanks to the resounding silence (perhaps the highest of compliments, considering the material) I have determined to post more, as she must be making an impact. In this passage she refers to the beginning of the Dark Night of the Senses and why one embarks upon it, indeed, why it is truly necessary to embark upon it.

from The Science of the Cross
St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein)

On the other hand, something entirely new is begun when the Dark Night starts. The entirely comfortable being-at-home in the world, the satiety of pleasures that it offers, the demand for these pleasures and the matter-of-course consent to these demands--all of this that human nature considers bright daily life--all of this is darkness in God's eyes and incompatible with the divine light. It has to be totally uprooted if room for God is to be made in the soul. Meeting this demand means engaging in battle with one's own nature all along the line, taking up one's cross and delivering oneself up to be crucified. Holy Father St. John here invokes the Lord's saying in this connection: "Whoever does not renounce all that the will possesses cannot be my disciple" [Lk. 14:33].

And it is in this last line that the true hardship of the word comes. It isn't that we can't be saved or we can't enter into heaven, but at times that seems like so small a goal compared with that of serving the Lord as Disciple. And discipleship is costly. I would recommend Bonhoeffer's book The Cost of Discipleship were it not so virulently anti-Catholic. But he points out in the course of the work that many of us want a costless or cheap discipleship. Such a discipleship is inauthentic--and that makes sense. How can carrying a cross be cheap or costless? If we wish to serve Christ in this world and in the world to come, it will only be at great cost. Consider the very short parable of the man who found a pearl of great price and sold all that he owned to purchase it. That is the cost--all that we think we own, all that we think is ours, all that the senses "possess," these must be completely surrendered to God as the "cost" of serving Him. And the cost yields a valuable rebate. No matter how much we give up and give to Him, He returns countless amounts more in the freedom, peace, and serenity of serving Him.

The gradual shedding of the world's hold on us is a necessary prerequisite to focusing our attention completely upon the Crucified One. And what other meaning in life is there? If Jesus is not the complete focus then we are not seeing anyway--so what loss is our sight of this world?

(Tomorrow, perhaps, I will include the précis of what is required to enter the dark night of the senses--other than the call by grace, of course.)

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:17 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

March 14, 2004

Ascent of Mount Carmel X

The Ascent of Mount Carmel X--Book II, Chapters 9-12

Read pages177-189 in The Ascent of Mount Carmel

Chapter 9
1-5 Pick one of the "proofs" John has suggested for faith being the proximate and proportionate means for the intellect to approach divine union and read it carefully. Listen to what John says about it. Come ready to share what you have heard in prayer.

Chapter 10

2. In what ways can the intellect get ideas? How do these two differ?

3. Into what categories is supernatural knowledge divided? How do they differ?

4. What are the five types of spiritual knowledge? (Two major subdivisions, one with four means of revelation, the other with only one.)

Chapter 11

1. What does John say the first book of the Ascent of Mount Carmel is about? How is supernatural knowledge delivered to the exterior senses?

2. What important warning does John give about these apprehensions?

3. What is the main danger of cherishing and thinking about these apprehensions?

4. As these apprehensions become more exterior what happens to their utility for the soul?

5. What happens to the person who esteems these apprehensions? Read and note the last sentence of this section very carefully. It is one of the most important points St. John and St. Teresa have to make about supernatural visitations.

6. If we are to ignore them, why does God give visions and locutions? What happens to the person who receives them upon receiving them?

7. What are six possible negative effects of desiring further visions and locutions?

8. What is one danger of not rejecting these apprehensions?

9. What will happen to the person who deals with these apprehensions as St. John suggests?

10. John uses the image of the Beast of the Apocalypse with seven heads and ten horns. Look at the scripture reference and see how John uses it to describe what happens in the mansions.

11-13 These sections are a recap and a summary of what went before. What is St. John's continually repeated strong advice for us in the face of supernatural apprehensions?

Chapter 12

1. What apprehensions are imparted to the interior senses?

2. What must we do to the interior senses once we have become sufficiently advanced in the prayer life? (Please note that imaginative apprehensions are often useful in the early stages of prayer, so one must carefully gauge where one is (preferably with the help of a spiritual director) before one makes the decision to abandon these.)

3-4 What are imagination and phantasy? Why is it necessary at some point to abandon them?

5. How can these apprehensions get in the way of union with God?

6-8 What is the best advice for one looking to advance in the spiritual life? Why is this so important? What might happen if the advice is ignored? What might happen if the advice is employed too early in one's prayer life?

Please feel free to use these notes as a study guide or to lead others in reading The Ascent of Mount Carmel. I don't pretend that they are any more than one person's imperfect reflections on a great work, but they at least give a starting point for reflection. They just skim the surface, but, properly employed, I pray they might lead on to greater understanding.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:13 PM | TrackBack

February 22, 2004

Ascent of Mount Carmel IX

In which we revisit some old territory and forge into new

Ascent of Mount Carmel IX--Book II Chapter 6-8

Read pages 166-176

Chapter 6

1-4 How are the three faculties related to the theological virtues? What does each virtue do to each faculty?

6-8. What must we do to each of the faculties? Why?

Chapter 7
1-3 How does John use scripture metaphorically or in an analogy to explain the "narrow gate" and the "constricted way?" How is that important for us? What does it call on us to do?

4-5. What is the common misunderstanding even people of good will and good faith have of the passage from Mark (8:34-35)? What do spiritual people refuse to annhilate? Why might this be a problem?

What does a genuine spirit of prayer seek?

6. Where does all negation take place? Why is it necessary? Pick one of the verses St. John uses to support his arguments (Mt: 16: 25; Lk. 9:24; Jn 12:25; Mt 20:22) and take it with you for a short lectio. Write out the conclusion of your prayer--what are you called to do?

7. Where is the road of relief and sweetness? What happens to those who seek after things, either material or spiritual?

8.What is the one thing necessary in prayer life? To what does St. John liken failure to do this? What is accomplished if one does not do the one thing necessary?

9-11 How is the death necessary in the spirit like the Death of Christ Himself?

12-13 What topic will John next consider? What is his purpose?

Chapter 8

1. What is necessary to achieve union with God? Is it possible to use the intellect to obtain this?

2 St. John points out that the mean must be proportionate to the end. In one sense they must "resemble" the end that will result. Study his example of the fire and the log until this point is clear.

3. John uses this section to point out that there is no creature proportionate to God. Use what you learned above to affirm John's conclusion that it would not be possible for a creaturely means to end in an eternal God. What does John state is not possible based on creatures for the intellect?

4. What other things do not lend help to the intellect in obtaining Union with God?

5. What third category of things is not useful in obtaining Union with God? Why?

6. What is another way to think about contemplation? What must the intellect do to reach Union with God?

Consider the points St. John made in the passages we have read. Where do they lead in prayer? What must we do? How do we go about it? Think of one way you can take positive steps toward union with God. What above all else is necessary for this motion?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:25 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Some Hard Words of St. John of the Cross

St. John of the Cross in The Ascent of Mount Carmel (book II, chapter 6 to be precise) tells us that faith is the dark night of the intellect. It took me a great many readings to begin to understand what St. John meant by this statement. Faith accepts and integrates in a supernatural way what the intellect can only assent to.

For example, we know by faith that Jesus is fully human and fully God. We know this only by faith because, while the intellect may parse the sentence and be able to make a comprehensible statement of the individual words, the statement itself is not resolvable within the intellect. We can make all sorts of tortured analogies and metaphors, but the intellect "knows" that what is 100% one thing cannot be 100% something else. It is inconceivable that something might be 100% dog and 100% cat at the same time. So too, it is not possible to apprehend with mere intellectual prowess the means by which the truth is accomplished in Jesus. Nevertheless, we know it is. We know this by faith--the intellect assents to it, and thus seems to know it--but if we really grappled with the statement with mind alone we would not be able to resolve it. In the darkness of faith we assent and know this as part of the reality around us. It is truer than many things that we can prove, and more a part of our world. (For example how many people care about Euclid's hypothesis of parallel lines and points extraneous to them? How relevant is that for the majority of us.)

In the end, it is not what we know. We start by knowing, but eventually the understanding must be darkened because it is constantly looking for explanations and God will choose to perfect us in faith, where the understanding is rooted so deep that we have no need of proofs. The proofs are the breathing we do every day.

So, when wrassling with theological imponderables or Christological controversies, take heart. It little matters what the outcome, so long as the will continues to follow and seek out God, because our imperfect understandings will be perfected in the Dark Night of Faith.

(Yes, I know this is a horrific thought to the Jesuits and Domincans among us, but both St. Ignatius and St. Dominic eventually testify to its truthfulness. St. John of the Cross didn't come up with anything new, he simply stated it for all to see and read.)

Posted by Steven Riddle at 2:17 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

November 7, 2003

The Marian Nature of St. John of the Cross

It is often difficult to think of St. John of the Cross in particularly Marian terms. Not much of his writing touches on the Mother of God, and yet, that may be because she touches every part of his writing in so deep a way as to go almost unnoticed. We have the Blessed Martyr Titus Brandsma to thank for helping to bring this to our attention:

from Carmelite Mysticism Historical Sketches
"The Marian "Doctor Mysticus"
Blessed Titus Brandsma

A much loved comparison of the saint which he employs to express the necessity of our being susceptible and pure in order to partake of the grace of God, and even share the divine nature, is the image of the window through which the sunlight passes. The painters of the Flemish country, the land of Memling, of Quinten Matsys made a plentiful use of this image through their wonderful miniatures. No creature absorbed more purely the divine light that came into this world; no creature gave it back with less blemish or spot and grew more one with God than Our Lady. In the cherished metaphor of St. John of the Cross, Mary appears before our mind's eye as the greatest example of all; nay more, as the first pane of glass without spot, who gave us the light of the world. To her, more than to anyone else, may be applied the words of St. John of the Cross explaining the divine communing of the mystic life: "So close is the created communion, if God grants it this excellent and elevated favour, that the soul and everything that is proper to God are united by a participating re-creation. The soul seems more God than soul, even is God, through this participation, although its natural being, in spite of its re-creation, remains as distinct from God's being as before; just as the pane of glass, however lit up by the sun's beams yet retains its proper essence, different from the beam that passes into it." He further explains the image in a way that more directly concerns Our Blessed Lady. If the pane of glass be clean and spotless, the sunbeam will light it up and change it in such a way that it seems to be the light itself and gives out light itself. That is the reason why Our Lady deserved to become the Mother of God; because she offered not the slightest hinderance to the divine indwelling. Like Our Lady we must absorb the divine light.

For the complete series of essays, go here

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:58 AM | TrackBack

October 17, 2003

From St. John of the Cross

from The Ascent of Mount Carmel Book II Chapter 22 St. John of the Cross

In giving us, as He has done, His Son, who is his only Word, He has spoken to us once and for all by His own and only Word, and has nothing further to reveal.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:20 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

September 5, 2003

St. John of the Cross

St. John of the Cross IX--Dark Night of the Soul II

Ascent of Mount Carmel Study--Dark Night Digression part II

This month we end our brief digression into Dark Night of the Soul. Please read pages 367-375 (Book 1 Chapters 4-7).

Prepare a table consisting of three columns and eight rows. In the header row:

Spiritual Sin/ Signs and Symptoms/Actions to be Taken or Cure

In the Lead Column: Spiritual Pride, Spiritual Avarice, Spiritual Lust, Spiritual Anger, Spiritual Gluttony, Spiritual Envy, Spiritual Sloth.

Fill out the final five, and as a review go back to the first two. Make a list of three actions to take in the next month related to finding and rooting out signs of these sins.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:38 AM

August 7, 2003

Count on St. John of the Cross for Just the Right Words

Count on St. John of the Cross for Just the Right Words

from The Ascent of Mount Carmel III:38.3 St. John of the Cross

How many festivals, my God, do the children of men celebrate in Your honor in which the devil has a greater role than You! And the devil, like a merchant is pleased with these gatherings because he does more business on those days. How many times will You say of them: This people honors Me with their lips alone, but their heart is far from Me, because they serve me without cause [Mt 15:8-9]

Indeed!

Posted by Steven Riddle at 3:25 PM

August 4, 2003

Some Astonishing Words from Saint John of the Cross

Some Astonishing Words from Saint John of the Cross

I had feared that the clarity of St. John's declaration would be lost in the E. Allison Peers's translation, but it is still there. I offer first, St. John's tremendous metaphor of the pane of glass and the ray of light, and then the conclusion springing from that line of thought.

from The Ascent of Mount Carmel--Book II, Chapter 5 St. John of the Cross

6. In order that both these things may be the better understood, let us make a comparison. A ray of sunlight is striking a window. If the window is in any way stained or misty, the sun's ray will be unable to illumine it and transform it into its own light, totally, as it would if it were clean of all these things, and pure; but it will illumine it to a lesser degree, in proportion as it is less free from those mists and stains; and will do so to a greater degree, in proportion as it is cleaner from them, and this will not be because of the sun's ray, but because of itself; so much so that, if it be wholly pure and clean, the ray of sunlight will transform it and illumine it in such wise that it will itself seem to be a ray and will give the same light as the ray. Although in reality the window has a nature distinct from that of the ray itself, however much it may resemble it, yet we may say that that window is a ray of the sun or is light by participation. And the soul is like this window, whereupon is ever beating (or, to express it better, wherein is ever dwelling) this Divine light of the Being of God according to nature, which we have described.

7. In thus allowing God to work in it, the soul (having rid itself of every mist and stain of the creatures, which consists in having its will perfectly united with that of God, for to love is to labour to detach and strip itself for God's sake of all that is not God) is at once illumined and transformed in God, and God communicates to it His supernatural Being, in such wise that it appears to be God Himself, and has all that God Himself has. And this union comes to pass when God grants the soul this supernatural favour, that all the things of God and the soul are one in participant transformation; and the soul seems to be God rather than a soul, and is indeed God by participation; although it is true that its natural being, though thus transformed, is as distinct from the Being of God as it was before, even as the window has likewise a nature distinct from that of the ray, though the ray gives it brightness.

Astonishing. So much so that my group and I spent the better part of two hours talking about this single passage--its implications, ramifications, and its purpose.

St. John of the Cross tells us that in complete union we beome God by participation. That is, in the best Buddhist sense, all that remains of us in terms of things antithetical to God has vanished--the "Ego" but not the self. This is very difficult to explain, but it marks one of many places where Buddhist doctrine varies from Christian. Buddhists strive for the state of extinction of self. That can be interpreted as the irradication of all that keeps one from God. But explicitly it seems to be the annhilation of personality. I used to think St. John of the Cross was very Buddhist in his teaching, but reading carefully, I have learned better. St. John makes the point that one retains one's own nature. What is annhiliated is all that prevents God from shining through one.

The way I explained it to the Carmelite Group was in comparison to a stained-glass window. Each pane of glass has its distinctive coloration, shape, and placement in the window. As each is purified and made truly transparent rather than merely translucent, each retains its color, shape and position--its unique nature within the window frame. We become God by participation, but the delivery of God is mediated by His vessel--the particular pane of glass. Thus we have St. Thérèse of Lisieux, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Jerome, and St. John of the Cross. No two of these are exactly the same or even remotely similar, and yet all became unique conveyances of God, unique Godly participators in spreading His word and glory.

We would all do well to spend some time truly reflecting upon the meaning of this passage in our own lives. We all have the potential to become "God by participation," and, in fact, we all have that as our root calling and goal. To fall short of it is, as either Peguy or Bloy is paraphrased as saying, the only real tragedy.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:40 AM

July 30, 2003

Ascent of Mount Carmel VIII--We Make a Digression

Ascent Study VIII--An Excursion into Dark Night of the Soul

Last month's reading leads very naturally into the brief sojourn we will take into Dark Night of the Soul. Please read Dark Night of the Soul chapters 1-3 (pp. 361-367)

Chapter 1

1. What does Saint John of the Cross intend to discuss in the next seven chapters?

What does Saint John say distinguishes beginners from proficients?

2. How does Saint John liken the beginner to a little child? What part does God play in the beginner's prayer?

3. Why are beginners in such need of consolations from God? Why is the work of beginners so feeble?

Chapter 2

1. What are some results of the secret pride beginners take in their prayer?

2. What part does the Devil play in this? What are the results of this?

3. Why is it important to listen to and obey the guidance of your spiritual director? What is disobedience a sign of?

4. Why do beginners become envious? What do they do as a result?

5. What is the wrong motivation for asking God to remove our faults?

6. How does one advance and avoid the worst of the imperfections of pride?

7. What do beginners advancing in perfection desire and require?

8. Where are these souls perfected?

Chapter 3

1. What is spiritual avarice? What are its signs and results?

2. How does the well-disposed soul, with the grace of God, avoid these imperfections?

3. What is the only source of purification from these faults?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:28 PM

July 3, 2003

Ascent of Mount Carmel VII--The Pane of Glass and the Light

Yes, so quickly that time has rolled around again. After this little lesson, I'll probably ask my group to take a look at the first portion of Dark Night of the Soul because it very effectively lists the traps and pitfalls of beginners in prayer.

Ascent of Mount Carmel VII The Pane of Glass and the Light

Read Book II Chapters 5-6 (pgs. 162-168)

Chapter 5

1-2. What does John of the Cross imply about the state of Union with God?
Read the footnote carefully. What are the chief distinctions of Union? (If you wish to understand this better, read pages 576-577, 641-642, and 713-715; however, it is not necessary to do so.)

3. What is substantial union? Why is it important? What is the Union of Likeness? How does one achieve it?

4. What is the importance of ridding oneself of creatures?

6. Explain what St. John of the Cross means by the Light and the pane of glass.

What does it imply about the necessity for detachment and purification?

7. How do we best describe the transformation of the soul in union with God?

8-9. What is the necessary preparation for union? What does St. John mean by his example of the painting?

10-11. Are all states of union the same? On what is any degree of union based? What happens to those who do not reach the purity the are capable of?

Chapter 6
1-4 How are the three faculties related to the theological virtues? What does each virtue do to each faculty?

6-8. What must we do to each of the faculties? Why?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:20 AM

June 30, 2003

Talk About Dismaying

Talk About DismayingIn my study of The Ascent of Mount Carmel I was sent by footnote to the first few chapters of Dark Night of the Soul The first chapter of this great work will require greater explication and discussion at another time, because right now I wish to make a public confession, hoping that it will help me amend my behavior. In the third chapter of the first book we have the following description:

from Dark Night of the Soul Book 1, Chapter 3 St. John of the Cross

MANY of these beginners have also at times great spiritual avarice. They will be found to be discontented with the spirituality which God gives them; and they are very disconsolate and querulous because they find not in spiritual things the consolation that they would desire. Many can never have enough of listening to counsels and learning spiritual precepts, and of possessing and reading many books which treat of this matter, and they spend their time on all these things rather than on works of mortification and the perfecting of the inward poverty of spirit which should be theirs. Furthermore, they burden themselves with images and rosaries which are very curious; now they put down one, now take up another; now they change about, now change back again; now they want this kind of thing, now that, preferring one kind of cross to another, because it is more curious. And others you will see adorned with agnusdeis and relics and tokens, like children with trinkets. Here I condemn the attachment of the heart, and the affection which they have for the nature, multitude and curiosity of these things, inasmuch as it is quite contrary to poverty of spirit which considers only the substance of devotion, makes use only of what suffices for that end and grows weary of this other kind of multiplicity and curiosity. For true devotion must issue from the heart, and consist in the truth and substances alone of what is represented by spiritual things; all the rest is affection and attachment proceeding from imperfection; and in order that one may pass to any kind of perfection it is necessary for such desires to be killed.

[emphasis added]

He hit the nail on the head for me. I am so often wrapped up in reading about spiritual matters and trying to take counsel from one and all that I end up putting relatively little of it into practice in a relatively remote and mild way. Yes I pray. And yes, I think I'm praying as I read these books seeking to mend my ways and my life. But the reality is, at least in part, I do what I do to avoid prayer and quiet time with God. He frightens me, not because of who He is, but because of who I am. Approaching Him, I feel like the Cowardly Lion approaching the Wizard of Oz. I don't know what I expect, except perhaps that it is likely to be painful, unpleasant, and difficult. My expectation have not been met most of the time, but there are times, sometimes long times, when they are. I say this with full intent of accusing myself and with certain knowledge that it may alienate some. I pray that you do not think less of my mentors or of the great Saints who have guided me because I am such a feeble reflection of their guidance and goodness. The passage just before that which referred me to the Dark Night has one of the most famous of St. John of the Cross's metaphors and I put it here to complete the picture.

from The Ascent of Mount Carmel Book 2, Chapter 5 St. John of the Cross

6. In order that both these things may be the better understood, let us make a comparison. A ray of sunlight is striking a window. If the window is in any way stained or misty, the sun's ray will be unable to illumine it and transform it into its own light, totally, as it would if it were clean of all these things, and pure; but it will illumine it to a lesser degree, in proportion as it is less free from those mists and stains; and will do so to a greater degree, in proportion as it is cleaner from them, and this will not be because of the sun's ray, but because of itself; so much so that, if it be wholly pure and clean, the ray of sunlight will transform it and illumine it in such wise that it will itself seem to be a ray and will give the same light as the ray. Although in reality the window has a nature distinct from that of the ray itself, however much it may resemble it, yet we may say that that window is a ray of the sun or is light by participation. And the soul is like this window, whereupon is ever beating (or, to express it better, wherein is ever dwelling) this Divine light of the Being of God according to nature, which we have described.

7. In thus allowing God to work in it, the soul (having rid itself of every mist and stain of the creatures, which consists in having its will perfectly united with that of God, for to love is to labour to detach and strip itself for God's sake of all that is not God) is at once illumined and transformed in God, and God communicates to it His supernatural Being, in such wise that it appears to be God Himself, and has all that God Himself has. And this union comes to pass when God grants the soul this supernatural favour, that all the things of God and the soul are one in participant transformation; and the soul seems to be God rather than a soul, and is indeed God by participation; although it is true that its natural being, though thus transformed, is as distinct from the Being of God as it was before, even as the window has likewise a nature distinct from that of the ray, though the ray gives it brightness.

8. This makes it clearer that the preparation of the soul for this union, as we said, is not that it should understand or perceive or feel or imagine anything, concerning either God or aught else, but that it should have purity and love -- that is, perfect resignation and detachment from everything for God's sake alone; and, as there can be no perfect transformation if there be not perfect purity, and as the enlightenment, illumination and union of the soul with God will be according to the proportion of its purity, in greater or in less degree; yet the soul will not be perfect, as I say, if it be not wholly and perfectly bright and clean.

I think I say enough when I say the passage was written for me and it seems that I need to make a major investment in some spiritual Windex.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:30 AM

June 26, 2003

Yet a Little More About Detachment

Incrementally, the discussion continues. Please bear with me. As people bring up points, it seems that there is more to say.

Today's point--detachment is not a comfortable or easy exercise.

Below a commenter says that "it is easy to slip from detachment to indifference when it is difficult for you to form attachments anyway." Part of that statement evokes a certain misunderstanding of what detachment is. First to repeat: the point of detachment is to love God and the love of God needs some expression. That expression is found in love of neighbor and self. Proper exercise of detachment becomes a discipline of self-giving.

The desire or habit of not forming relationships is an attachment itself. There is something that has proven successful about not forming relationships. So detachment forces one out of this stable mode and into the mode of loving God through loving neighbhor. Love without works is dead (as St. Therese implies). And Jesus tells us, if we love Him, we will keep His Commandments. One of His commandments is feed the hungry, clothe the naked, etc. When becoming detached from our own preferences and our own desires, the road to indifference is a temptation, but not when the way of detachment is clearly the way of the cross.

Detachment is uncomfortable. It is a source of constant unease. It is constantly against the grain. If we would rather not become involved, then we are attached to the concept of non-involvement. And it is from this that we may have to work particularly hard to escape.

This is where detachment becomes really difficult. It's hard to identify what the attachments are. Sometimes they are defense mechanisms so thoroughly ingrained we can't see them. Sometimes they are participation in a really good thing. For example, if you absolutely must go to a Latin Mass--you wrench your schedule, the schedule of your friends and family, and generally discomfit and discombobulate everyone and everything around you in the search for a Latin Mass, that is a pretty certain sign of attachment. If you go to a Mass in English that, except for being in English, is otherwise properly conducted and carp about the music, the way the prayers are said, whether one is standing or kneeling, etc.--you are probably attached. When you cannot see Jesus for want of your preferences, attachment is indicated. John of the Cross says that even when you prefer your food prepared a certain way and will not eat otherwise, that is an attachment. (Obviously this is aside from doctor's orders. In fact, the unwillingness to follow a doctor's orders with respect to food indicates attachment.)

So, one of the difficulties is identifying the attachments. That is where prayer, patience, and focus help. If our eyes are on Jesus and we truly love and adore Him, everything else fades into the distance. Jesus truly becomes Lord of our life, and detachment from created things is a natural corollary. We might start by working at detachment, but unless our eyes are firmly set on Christ and Him Crucified, we will quickly lose our way.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:36 AM

June 17, 2003

Parsing the Counsels of St. John of the Cross III: Consolation

In this counsel we hear the echo of the great St. Francis of Assisi:

Strive always to prefer. . . Not that which is consolation, but rather that which is disconsolateness

Always keep in mind that introductory phrase of the counsels--it is critically important. "Strive always to prefer" is an explicit injunction to habit of mind, training in thinking, feeling, and doing. In this case it is not a command to go out and make yourself miserable. As in all things, when we have a choice of spending time with those who are mourning and grieving, who are hurt and wounded, or those who are "making merry," we should prefer to spend time with those who are hurt. When we have a choice between hard work and leisure, we should prefer the hard work. When we have a choice of working with great emotional satisfaction and having our work constantly criticized and demeaned, we should choose the latter. Why? Again the refrain--because it is a discipline that teaches us to value our work for what it really is. It teaches us to let go of anything connected with us and let it rise to praise God. When we are enormously attached to our work we can only do as well as we can do. When we let go of it, we let it rise to God in splendor and He perfects the work--perhaps even unto the salvation of souls.

Why disconsolateness? Because the lack of emotional reward and even emotional hardship causes us to lean more heavily upon Him who bears our burdens and carries us over the difficult track. When we take great satisfaction and contentment in our work and our lives we are less inclined to look at Him. When we are downcast and not focused on ourselves we look at the Face of Glory and in it have some great respite from our Earthly trials.

Prefer always to serve without notice, to serve those who are unappreciative, to serve without emotional reward, to seek out those who grieve and mourn, those whom we find less pleasant company, and like St. Thérèse bestow upon them a small benediction--a smile, a handshake, a hearty good morning, some sense of that person being welcomed. Do not seek to rest in pleasant and easy emotions, but seek to work through rough periods and to put everything into God's hands. In not seeking consolation we attain the very greatest consolation there is--God Himself.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:53 AM

June 12, 2003

Parsing the Counsels of St. John of the Cross

Parsing the Counsels of St. John of the Cross II

Strive always to prefer, not that which is easiest, but that which is most difficult; . . . Strive thus to desire to enter into complete detachment and emptiness and poverty, with respect to everything that is in the world, for Christ's sake.

It seems best to quote not just the counsel but the ultimate goal. Many of the counsels are perfectly obvious. One doesn't need to explain what the statement "Strive to prefer not that which is easiest but that which is most difficult." It's meaning is perfectly transparent; however, the reason for it may not be. This sounds like making things difficult for yourself for no particular reason--which is why I quoted the end of the counsels as well. The goal is detachment from self--detachment from the nexus of selfishness and self-centeredness that comprises most people.

The first step is detachment from our own preferences and complacency. If you look at the entire list of counsels (included in this post) you will see that everyone of them is a call to action. They require us to abandon passivity and make some sort of effort. This is odd, because most people seem to think that St. John of the Cross was about inaction--allowing things to flow over one and pass away. That is also true. This is a paradox that others can explain better than I, but I suppose it is best to say that even allowing things to flow over one is an active practice because one must sometimes push them off and speed them on their way.

Why all of this emphasis on action, activity, and comfortlessness? The answer is simple and we have all experienced it. In times of turmoil, upset, and emotional overflow, we find it far easier to turn to God for help and solace, to think about Him frequently, and even if we do not pray coherently, we offer up petitions and cries for help. During the "good times" we are far too inclined to forget that God has provided the good times. We pay lip service, and I'm sure many do thank God sincerely, but good times tend not to elicit the depth of response. Part of what St. John is doing in the counsels is recommending that we always be ready to stir the pot. Detachment is not a passive exercise--it takes great determination, strength of will, and an endless supply of strengthening grace. To be able to achieve it, we must flex muscles we rarely use. St. John tells us how. He tells us not to seek comfort, where we are inclined to rest on our laurels and allow things to move as they will, but always to seek out work and the harder way.

It is interesting, but St. John's way even makes sense psychologically. All of our experts tell us that when we are stressed or angry we should engage in some vigorous physical activity or exercise. No matter the reason, such activity tends to disengage us from thoughts about ourselves and direct us toward our activity. We move out of the center and toward other things. St. John's goal is to make sure that God is Who we are moving toward. Thus when he makes all this advice that sounds wearisome and dreadful, our reactions are those of people on the outside looking in. When I hear about the life of a Saint from a Saint, I don't hear endless complaints about toil and effort and endless fruitless labor. I hear statements like, "Something beautiful for God" or "Small things with great devotion" or any of a number of phrases that show us that detachment and work for the Lord is the greatest of pleasures--that only in service to Him are we truly refreshed and relieved of the cares of this world. This servitude makes us free, this service gives us true rest. In the world we must be both Martha and Mary, for though Mary has the better part, it is only the effort of Martha that make it possible. So, to rest in the better part we must work in our wills and in our world.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:07 AM

June 10, 2003

Parsing the Counsels of St. John of the Cross

Not that which is most delectable, but that which is most unpleasing;

I'm starting with the second of the several counsels I posted yesterday. I'm starting with this because it is in many ways one of the easier ones to discuss both in terms of requirements and results.

Here St. John of the Cross advises us to cultivate an attitude of mind that allows us to make small mortifications of the flesh in order to discipline our wills not to seek out sensory delights. This is one of the most obvious because it is one in which most of us indulge ourselves. Let us start at the most basic level--when we are presented with choices, in food, for example, we are not to choose that which most pleases us and which delights the taste buds, but that which we would prefer not to eat. Now, first, reiterate the reasons for this choosing. Food that is well-prepared and that tastes good is NOT sinful, nor is it wrong to delight in such food. And if our host should place such food before us, we should in good fellowship and with a sense of Christian Harmony partake of it to some extent less than gluttony. However, when we are presented with a choice, it is better to choose the thing we less like to eat and to offer that choice to God as a small sacrifice, and to ourselves as a small advance on where we were. That is, by depriving ourselves of, say, Beef Wellington, and eating instead say lima beans and corn bread we perform a small mortification that actually helps others indirectly and that tries to rein in the rampaging horses that are appetite and desire.

What John seems to emphasize is that each choice can be made to discipline desire and to offer glory to God. The Buddhists call a similar approach to things "mindfulness." Father de Mello referred to it as Awareness. We need to be aware of our choices and to take control of them--not merely to be disciplined, but as a voluntary offering to the Lord who offered everything to us. We must gratefully accept all things from His hands, and to the extent possible, offer them back to Him. We do this in the small things. St Thérèse is often misunderstood when she speaks of "small things with great devotion and love," but this is exactly what she refers to. Every day we have innumerable choices, and each choice should be made in such a way as to direct our attention to God. Everything we eat, everything we do, even everything we choose to look at. It is an austere way and a way of much discipline and small sacrifice, and yet, I cannot but think that it is a way arrayed in costliest finery--more splendid than gold and jewels, more marvelous than the most beautiful orchids, because it is a way paved with the Blood of Christ Himself and with the Blood of all the Martyrs in Flesh or of the Spirit who followed Him. It is a "little way" of Martyrdom to the enticements of the world, that robes us in the richest raiment possible.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:29 AM

June 9, 2003

St. John of the Cross--Counsels on Discipline and Love

St. John of the Cross--Counsels on Discipline and Love

At the end of the first book of The Ascent of Mount Carmel St. John of the Cross gives a magnificent set of directions for those who seek union with God. The whole point of the first book is that one must enter into the first Dark Night, called the active night of the senses. The active night is so called because it requires of the person some movement of will in order to accomplish entry. (In other words, it is not Quietist--waiting around for a stunning revelation to smack you upside the head.) It is the dark night of the sense because it aims first to purify the physical senses and data input, as it were. It deals with the sensual side of the human being, and the entry of sense information into the soul.

When talking about this with the Carmelite group on Saturday there was a collective gasp as they at last got the point--this is neither easy, nor pleasant, nor is it in accord to what we are taught by society and the world around us--and yet, it is utterly necessary as a first step forward. In sections 6-13, St. John gives some advice about how to enter into this first dark night. First, prior to any of this, one must have cultivated an active and fruitful prayer life in the ordinary mode--that is, Liturgy of the Hours, Mass, and other devotional and meditational prayers. So St. John of the Cross assumes a commitment to moving toward union for God, and he speaks of people who have all these prerequisites as "beginners" in prayer.

Next his practical advise follows in the translation by E. Allison Peers. I recommended this list as a daily examen for the members of the Carmelite community with the main question being--where did I do these things, where did I depart from this advice.

Ascent of Mount Carmel--Book I, Chapter 13, Section 6

Strive always to prefer,
not that which is easiest, but that which is most difficult;
Not that which is most delectable, but that which is most unpleasing;
Not that which gives most pleasure, but rather that which gives least;
Not that which is restful, but that which is wearisome;
Not that which is consolation, but rather that which is disconsolateness;
Not that which is greatest, but that which is least;
Not that which is loftiest and most precious, but that which is lowest and most despised;
Not that which is a desire for anything, but that which is a desire for nothing;
Strive to go about seeking not the best of temporal things, but the worst.
Strive thus to desire to enter into complete detachment and emptiness and poverty, with respect to everything that is in the world, for Christ's sake.

Now, what St. John of the Cross says here is that one must cultivate the mindset that seeks these things. However, there are two things he DOES NOT say that are commonly attributed to him. He does not say that material things are bad and to be avoided, and he does not say that one should go out of one's way to avoid these things if they are sent. By that I mean that we are to accept all things in God's will, but as a matter of discipline, when we are given a choice, we should choose according to these guidelines to gradually separate us from our attachments to physical things and sensations. What John is doing here in giving practical instruction on the words of St. Paul, "I know how to be rich and I know how to be poor." We are to know how to be each without being attached to either. That is to say, when good things come our way, we are to accept them gratefully as gifts from God and be equally grateful when the opportunity comes to let them go. I illustrate it with a little "parable" from my experience here in Florida. One day I looked out my back window and a Sandhill Crane couple and baby were strutting around the back yard as though they owned the place. This was a richness sent from God. The proper attitude to it is not to shut my eyes and wish it away or pretend it does not exist, but to thank God from the bottom of my heart for this blessing and then not to seek to lengthen it by, say, making a cage and putting these noble and magnificent birds in it. I praise God and let the gift go as easily as it comes, relishing the moment, grateful for the grace, and open to the movements of God's will. It is Job's famous statement, "The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away, blessed by the Lord."

That is the attitude we are to cultivate, not to seek to lengthen the pleasure of the experience, not to try to "own" it, but to allow it to happen, accept it gratefully, and allow it to pass, accepting all from the hand of God equally. But with our modern mindset and with society's encouragement, we are a people who must own and contain. We cannot let things go.

One person in the group brought up an interesting point, she said, "But as a mother with two small children, I really want those periods of quiet and respite that allow me to regenerate and be a better mother later." I pointed out to her that her desire for quiet was likely to make her unquiet. The need for the time of regeneration would be likely to engender short-temperedness and other negative qualities, because we seek rather than accepting what comes. There would be nothing wrong with using quiet time that comes to us to regenerate, but it is in seeking it that we go wrong, because then it becomes a driving goal--when we do not achieve it we are diminished, tired, angry, frustrated, and less capable of being ourselves. I noted that the saints seemed to work tirelessly, dawn to dusk, without complaint, without request for rest, though they undoubtedly could do with some. And they did this because their hearts were always seeking what God desired. They did not desire for themselves anything other than what God would give them. Their longing was always to demonstrate in the fullness of their being their tremendous love of Christ.

So, St. John of the Cross is training us to be saints. The question is, are we willing to accept the training? Are we willing to assume the "yoke that is easy, the burden that is light?" If so, we can boldly start to practice these disciplines, seeking always not to indulge the senses, but to indulge so far as we are able to discern it God's will, and to separate ourselves from the deep attachments that keep us as spirits in bondage unable to rise to the heights the Father wishes to give us.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 10:22 AM

June 6, 2003

Ascent of Mt. Carmel VI--Beginning of Book II

This is the part of the book that must be remarkably unpopular with the Thomists of the world--and which on the surface may seem to make no sense whatsoever. But that lack of sense is more a matter of misinterpretation and misrepresentation than it is a reality of the teaching of St. John of the Cross. And it does make sense when you pause to think about it.

It is important to bear in mind that St. John DOES NOT indicate that there is anything wrong or bad about intellect, mind, or study. But he does affirm quite clearly and with no possibility of demurral that there comes a point in the road to Union with God when this apparatus presents a far greater hurdle than it does a help. And it is at this point that it must be abandoned entirely. Not that we forget what we learned or refuse to use our minds, but rather that the insistence on answers, on knowing, and on having everything explained is abandoned in favor of the journey in "the Dark Night of Faith."

Ascent of Mount Carmel VI
Beginning of Book II

Read pages 154-162 (Chapter 1-4). St John of the Cross is beginning his discussion of the Dark Night of the Spirit. Book I dealt with the necessity of the Dark Night of the Senses. Each of the Dark Nights has two phases, one that we contribute to by effort of will, called the Active Dark Night and one that we do not do anything to contribute to, in which God acts as surgeon and doctor—the passive Dark Night.

Chapter 1
1. What is “the sheer grace” referred to in line 3 of the poem?
What is the secret ladder? Why does John use this image?
Why was the soul “disguised?” What effect does this have?
What does St. John mean by the last line of this section? Why is it important?

2. Why is the journey in darkness secure?
What is the darkness?
Why is “the house now all stilled?”
What is required of the soul to achieve a union of “simplicity and purity and love and likeness?”

3. Why is the darkness of stanza 2 darker than the Dark Night of Stanza 1? What does this indicate?

Chapter 2
1. Describe the three “parts” of the dark night. What does each consist of? What is the final arrival place?

2-3. What does the first night refer to? The second? Why is the second darker?

Chapter 3
1-2. Why is Faith a darkness? Read these two sections slowly, carefully, and several times. Explain them in your own words.
3. What does faith do in the soul?
4. Explain how the Dark Night of Faith gives the soul light.
5-6. Read these passages carefully. How does the dark night of faith give knowledge? How certain is that knowledge?

Chapter 4
1-2. Why must the soul “perfectly and voluntarily empty itself?”
3-4. How must the soul seek Union with God advance?
5. What does entering the road to union require of the soul? What do the many “modes” St. John refers to mean?
6. What should the soul’s desire and aim be?
7-8. Explain what St. John means when he says, “By blinding one’s faculties along this road one will see light. . . “ How will this happen?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:31 AM

May 29, 2003

One Darkest Night

The June/July Issue of First Things has a new translation of St.John of the Cross's most famous poem--here called "One Darkest Night." While the translation is in some ways a version that gives a far finer sense of the poetry of St. John than most previous translations, it has some minor flaws. The original Spanish is noted below for context. The majority of this critique will focus on the first stanza. (But this brief comment gives me the excuse to post the entire thing).

La noche oscura
St. John of the Cross

Canciones del alma que se goza de haber llegado al
alto estado de la perfección, que es la unión con Dios,
por el camino de la negación espiritual.

En una noche oscura,
con ansias en amores inflamada,
(¡oh dichosa ventura!)
salí sin ser notada,
estando ya mi casa sosegada.

A oscuras y segura,
por la secreta escala disfrazada,
(¡oh dichosa ventura!)
a oscuras y en celada,
estando ya mi casa sosegada.

En la noche dichosa,
en secreto, que nadie me veía,
ni yo miraba cosa,
sin otra luz ni guía
sino la que en el corazón ardía.

Aquésta me guïaba
más cierta que la luz del mediodía,
adonde me esperaba
quien yo bien me sabía,
en parte donde nadie parecía.

¡Oh noche que me guiaste!,
¡oh noche amable más que el alborada!,
¡oh noche que juntaste
amado con amada,
amada en el amado transformada!

En mi pecho florido,
que entero para él solo se guardaba,
allí quedó dormido,
y yo le regalaba,
y el ventalle de cedros aire daba.

El aire de la almena,
cuando yo sus cabellos esparcía,
con su mano serena
en mi cuello hería,
y todos mis sentidos suspendía.

Quedéme y olvidéme,
el rostro recliné sobre el amado,
cesó todo, y dejéme,
dejando mi cuidado
entre las azucenas olvidado.

First, a quibble--the translation does not include the famous header that is commonly called the "argument" of the poem. This is a standard literary device present in the poems of Milton and a great many others and it assists the reader in analyzing what follows. For this poem the header reads (in Kiernan Kavanaugh's and Otilio Rodriguez's translation):

Songs of the soul that rejoices in having reached the high state of perfection, which is union with God, by the path of spiritual negation.

The header tells us two things--that there is more than one song present here and the songs are about union with God. Now Kavanaugh and Rodriguez number the stanzas, as do other translations and manuscripts of the original. This tends to give the impression that each stanza is a song unto itself, which I suppose is one possibility--rather like a leider cycle. I tend to read it somewhat differently--I see two songs here that overlap at the fifth stanza. There appears to be a change of poetic direction so that stanza five ends the first song and gives rise to the second. At least the poem is intelligible read in that way. The author of the new translation has chosen to make the translation a single song--which, in fact is not antithetical to the original poetic intent despite the header.

Let's look briefly at a couple of more serious problems with the new translation. For some reason both the title and the first line of the first stanza are rendered "One darkest night." Literally the title is "The Dark Night" and the first line of stanza one is "On a dark night." There are two problems with this translation, one minor the other major. The minor problem is the disservice done to the English language. Darkest is a superlative. There can only be one such. Thus to say "One darkest night," has the flavor of redundancy and absurdity. Admittedly a small flaw, but a small flaw that has much more profound implications.

The implications come from the commentary on the poem. In The Ascent of Mount Carmel St. John of the Cross claims to be spelling out his theory of prayer and union with God in the form of a commentary on this poem. In fact the work comments only on the first two stanzas and then abandons the original structure. However, in commenting on those two John makes the important division between the active night of the senses and the active night of the spirit. Of this second, which he says was intended by the second stanza, he says that it is the darkest night of three--sense, spirit, and God. He likens the first to night with moonlight and starlight, the second to night without moon or any light at all, and the third to night beginning to be pierced by daylight. Thus, to say of the first stanza "One darkest night" gets around the use of the poem in The Ascent of Mount Carmel. I suppose this is only troublesome if the translation is used in conjunction with its commentary--nevertheless it is a flaw that would need to be remedied in order to make the poem useful for the commentary.

Now that I've quibbled it to death, I must say that the poem is refreshing. Let me quote the first full stanza to give you a sense of the rhythm and the beauty of the translation/paraphrase:

from "One Darkest Night" translated by Rhina P. Espaillat

One darkest night I went,
aflame with love's devouring eager burning--
O fortunate event!--
no witnesses discerning,
the house now still from which my steps were turning.

Now one could fault the choice of moving the action of the poem to the first line, but I see no real problem poetically with the choice--it is not literal, but it allows the poet to use the swinging rhythm caused by the gerunds in lines 2, 4, and 5. As you might well imagine, in Spanish nearly every line has a rhyme or a half-rhyme or at least an echoic phrasing. This translation very nicely captures the essence of that. I have a little problem with "no witnesses discerning" because of the connotative load of the word discern, but it is a choice I can live with for the sake of the overall effect.

In fact, despite my many quibbles here, I really like the translation and recommend it to everyone's attention. If you get First Things turn to page six and begin reading. Quiz in one week.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:07 AM

May 8, 2003

An Opportunity

Events in my life have arranged themselves in such a way as to be able to take advantage of the opportunities offered in the passage below:

from Ascent of Mount Carmel Book 1 Chapter 13 St. John of the Cross

6. Strive always to prefer, not that which is easiest, but that which is most difficult;

Not that which is most delectable, but that which is most unpleasing;

Not that which gives most pleasure, but rather that which gives least;

Not that which is restful, but that which is wearisome;

Not that which is consolation, but rather that which is disconsolateness;

Not that which is greatest, but that which is least;

Not that which is loftiest and most precious, but that which is lowest and most despised;

Not that which is a desire for anything, but that which is a desire for nothing;

Strive to go about seeking not the best of temporal things, but the worst.

Strive thus to desire to enter into complete detachment and emptiness and poverty, with respect to everything that is in the world, for Christ's sake.

And I can tell you that this is a lot better in the abstract than in the concrete. Moreover, I suspect that it is a lot better voluntarily entered into rather than being offered such opportunities. However, the Lord has a plan even if it seems obscure to me, and so I can avail myself of this opportunity or not at my choice. It seems that whichever choice I make in the event will fulfill the requirements of this passage--so, that is the long way of asking for your prayers and your thoughts as I enter into the next couple of weeks.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:06 AM

May 2, 2003

Carmelite and Domincans--Trying Again

Therese seems a bit irritated at the post below called "Domincans and Carmelites," perhaps correctly so--sometimes my fumbling repetitions and articulations are aggravating; however, I am striving to come to understanding myself and to balance the words of St. John of the Cross with the understandings that others have conveyed. Many times it is imprecision in my language that is the source of the frustration. I am a better poet than I am essayist and so sometimes I do not say precisely what I mean and so I try once again. And I must thank Therese for forcing me to this labor, for only in so doing do I straighten out the crooked places in my own head and finally begin to come to a real understanding of St. John of the Cross and the radical nature of his teaching on prayer and Union.

St. John of the Cross would certainly note that prayer and reading scripture and study are all good, meritorious and fine things. But he would also note that there comes a point in devotion (I haven't reached it yet) where study, particularly, but perhaps certain aspects of the other things can become obstacles to the greatest Good. The things themselves are not obstacles, but our inordinate desire to do them in the ways we have done, stand in the way of progress toward God. That is not that study becomes bad, but it becomes an obstacle because we are not willing to change what or how, but continue in our same plodding way. Thus the DESIRE to study stands in the way of the desire for Union. We would prefer to study than to really approach the royal throne.

Many deny that this may happen. They see that all study will inevitably lead to God. (At least this is how I read some statements defending intellectual pursuit.) Therese points out rightly that St. John of the Cross would stand against "Study for Study's sake." But he would also stand against the desire to study weighed against the desire for Union, and this is where constant discernment is necessary. St. Thomas Aquinas spent much of his life in study, approaching nearer and nearer the throne of grace as his studies carried him. His famous statement "all my words are as straw," is not a statement that the study was futile. I read that as the realization that he had reached the end of where study alone could take him, he relinquished the desire to continue as he had done and crossed the threshhold to divine Union--although I am certain that he must have experienced something similar throughout his life in order to progress so far. I see St. Thomas realizing not that study is bad, but that true Union with God requires laying down everything, just as Christ did, to approach the Throne of Grace.

Perhaps I read too much into this short statement, but I truly believe that it was this experience, in part, that shaped much of John's spirituality. Study is not bad--it is a good, a positive good. However, when the desire for study outweighs the desire for union the desire becomes an obstacle. It can become an obstacle for others when they are inclined already to study more than to pray. When reading books about spirituality becomes the predominant mode of discourse rather than direct encounters with our loving God, study has gone astray. It is not bad, but our desire for it is disordered and thus an obstacle.

On a personal note: I have reached this stage relatively earlier than many because study presents a temptation for me that may be greater for me for others because others are more properly focused. As an example, in my early twenties, I took it into my head that I would become a great hiker and outdoorsman. To achieve this goal, I read every book there was about hiking and doing things in the outdoors, but never set a foot outside.

I know I am not unique. There are a great many potential Fausts out there. I know further that there are many who are not aware that study can become an end in itself--not bad, but not the highest good. And so I continually try to say--study is good. Knowing the beloved is essential, but watch that study does not replace prayer, that it does not become a desire to "dissect God" and know how He works, rather than a desire to convey to all people the workings of God. This never seemed to get out of hand with St. Thomas Aquinas, because he seemed to accept when it should end. However, if we chose to look, we would probably find a great many for whom the desire for study became the end and an obstacle to the divine union they might otherwise have achieved.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:27 AM

Ascent of Mount Carmel Study Guide V

The Next Installment of the Study Guide

Ascent of Mount Carmel V

Read pages 149-153 (Book 1, Chapters 13-15). Chapter 13 is the key chapter of the entire first book.

Chapter 13
(1)
What does the first sentence tell you about the purpose of this chapter. What is the “active way”? Why is it important? What is the “passive way”? Who initiates it? Why does John want to set our advice here?

(2-3)
What is the first critical element of the active night of the sense? Why is this so? Read the last sentence of section 3 again—what does this seem to require of us?

(4)
What motive is most likely to help us in the imitation of Christ? Why? Look at John’s two examples and write down two similar examples from you own experience that you can begin to act on right now.

(5)
What is the purpose of the maxims that follow?

*(6) (Key Section 1)
Choose one of the statement that being “not to” and explain it in your own words. Name two ways that you could begin to put this maxim into effect. How might you begin to put all of them into action? Pray about it and discern a reasonable plan of action.

(7) What is likely to be a major obstacle to your success in entering this first dark night and beginning the Ascent?

(8-9)
How does the advice here help with the advice in section 6. What is John truly saying here?

(10-11)
What is the path of the Ascent. (Look back at the diagram on page 110-111) Is it possible to fail in the Ascent? How? Is the most direct route the easiest? the most sure?

*(12-13) (Key Section 2)
Summarize the teaching of these sections in a sentence or two that you can write down and carry with you. What is St. John of the Cross telling us about the conduct of the spiritual life here? Jesus tells us “He who sets hand to the plow and looks back is not worthy of the kingdom of God.” How are these statements similar?

Chapters 14-15
What is St. John’s point in these sections? How do they support the critical information in chapter 13?

Reflect:
How can we mentally and spiritually prepare ourselves to enter the Dark Night and thus begin our Ascent? Pray, consult with your spiritual director, and make you own plan for preparing yourself to carry out St. John’s teaching. Or perhaps you are already well along this road, what can you do to perfect your practice of it? Perhaps you are in a dry place waiting for God to take control. What practices might you implement that will sustain you through the dryness?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:59 AM

May 1, 2003

St. John of the Cross, redux

The ICS translation with additional information:

from The Ascent of Mount Carmel Book I Chapter 13 St. John of the Cross

2. Though these counsels for the conquering of the appetites are brief and few in number, I believe they are as profitable and efficacious as they are concise. A person who sincerely wants to practice them will need no others since all the others are included in these.

3. First, have habitual desire to imitate Christ in all your deeds by bringing your life into conformity with his. You must then study his life in order to know how to imitate him and behave in all events as he would.

4. Second, in order to be successful in the imitation, renounce and remain empty of any sensory satisfaction that is not purely for the honor and glory of God. Do this out of love for Jesus Christ. In his life he had no other gratification, nor desire any other, than the fulfillment of his Father's will, which he called his meat and food [Jn. 4:34].

For example, if you are offered the satisfaction of hearing that that have no relation to the service and glory of God, do not desire the pleasure of the hearing of these things. When you have an opportunity for the gratification of looking upon objects that will not help you love God more, do not desire this gratification or sight. And if in speaking there is a similar opportunity, act in the same way. And so on with all the sense insofar as you can duly avoid such satisfaction. If you cannot escape the experience of this satisfaction, it will be sufficient to have o desire for it.

By this method you should endeavor, then, to leave the senses as though in darkness, mortified and empty of that satisfaction. With such vigilance you will gain a great deal in a short time.

5. Many blessings flow when the four natural passions (joy, hope, fear, and sorrow) are in harmony and at peace. The following maxims contain a complete method for mortifying and pacifying them. If put into practice these maxims will give rise to abundant merit and great virtues.

6. Endeavor to be inclined always:
not to the easiest, but to the most difficult;
not to the most delightful, but to the most distasteful;
not to the most gratifying, but to the less pleasant;
not to what means rest for you, but to hear work;
not to the consoling, but to he unconsoling;
not to the most, but to the least;
not to the highest and most precious, but to the lowest and most despised;
not to wanting something, but to wanting nothing.

Do not go about looking for the best of temporal things, but for the worst, and, for Christ, desire to enter into complete nakedness, emptiness, and poverty in everything in the world.

7. You should embrace these practices earnestly and try to overcome the repugnance of your will toward them. If you sincerely put them into practice with order and discretion, you will discover in them great delight and consolation.

Tr. by Kiernan Kavanaugh and Otilio Rodriguez

I repeat these in the clearer translation for fear that I may have misrepresented both St. John and His teaching in the post below where I have excerpted his work. Tom asked a question that led me to believe that I must have made untoward claims for what is said here, so I'm trying to quote enough to let the passage speak clearly for itself without unduly wearying the reader.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 5:32 PM

Dominicans and Carmelites If you

Dominicans and Carmelites

If you read the excerpt from St. John of the Cross below, you will have a better understanding of the ground on which John da Fiesole and I stand when we cross swords on the question of what is the purpose of study and how much should be done. I would claim to be one of the least anti-intellectual people I know, and yet, I fully follow my mentor. I seek to know all about God, and so my desire to find out myself must be subsumed to His will for me, whatever that may be. At least that is how I understand it. My desire to pursue knowledge is actually a hindrance to the kind of knowledge (Love) that I really want. Difficult to imagine, but at least that is how I understand St. John of the Cross, and thus my attempts always to temper those who hold up study as one of the highest efforts of humankind. It is, and yet, if St. John is right, it also is quite likely to get in the way.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 5:04 PM

Don't Feed the Animals!

I actually received an e-mail that asked me a question about which I can blather endlessly, in theory. One must understand that I have not reached these exalted heights and so all that I say is a synthesis of others.

The question:

"I've heard of two dark nights--dark night of the soul and dark night of the senses. The latter I take to be a kind of depression or unhappiness, the former the true unitive dark night. Any clarification?" (This is a gross paraphrase.)

Okay--let me talk about St. John of the Cross's scheme of spiritual growth in the via negativa. The way he sees development in prayer is through two DIFFERENT dark nights. The first of these two is called "the dark night of the senses." It consists of two parts, as does the latter. The first of these parts is the active, the second passive. In the dark night of the senses we enter into a deliberate attempt not to gratify the appetites. In olden days we would say that we would practice "custody of the eyes." But in the case of this dark night, we do not seek to gratify the senses--we deprive ourselves, as a matter of discipline and out of love of the Lord of those things we strongly desire. This is more than asceticism--it is a deliberate attempt to break the chains of desire that hold us away from God. If we love any creature inordinately, we cannot love God as He deserves. With this practice we enter into the dark night. In God's good time, as He sees fit, we may enter the passive night of the senses, in which God completes the purgation begun by our own effort and perfects it.

The second dark night is called the dark night of the spirit, and it too has a passive and an active phase. The second night focuses more on the spiritual faculties--intellect, memory, and the will, not the senses. I have yet to fully understand this, as I am slowly moving through the Ascent of Mount Carmel and Dark Night of the Soul. If you'd care to read more about this from someone far more knowledgeable than I, look here. Mr. Doohan does a wonderful job of explaining what may seem like abstruse doctrine in very comprehensible terms.

I'm still working--largely unsuccessfully--on the active night of the senses. But I have great hope that God will see fit to aid me in His time and in His way.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 5:01 PM

An Instruction on Prayer from St John of the Cross

St. John of the Cross considered this part of the only information a beginner or proficient in prayer needed to know to continue. Obviously, he expected a lot of his beginners. These instructions are how to enter the active night of the senses--one part of the Dark night over which we have some control.

from The Ascent of Mount Carmel Book 1, Chapter 13 St. John of the Cross

10. To conclude these counsels and rules, it will be fitting to set down here those lines which are written in the Ascent of the Mount, which is the figure that is at the beginning of this book; the which lines are instructions for ascending to it, and thus reaching the summit of union. For, although it is true that that which is there spoken of is spiritual and interior, there is reference likewise to the spirit of imperfection according to sensual and exterior things, as may be seen by the two roads which are on either side of the path of perfection. It is in this way and according to this sense that we shall understand them here; that is to say, according to that which is sensual. Afterwards, in the second part of this night, they will be understood according to that which is spiritual.

11. The lines are these:

In order to arrive at having pleasure in everything, Desire to have pleasure in nothing.
In order to arrive at possessing everything, Desire to possess nothing.
In order to arrive at being everything, Desire to be nothing.
In order to arrive at knowing everything, Desire to know nothing.
In order to arrive at that wherein thou hast no pleasure, Thou must go by a way wherein thou hast no pleasure.
In order to arrive at that which thou knowest not, Thou must go by a way that thou knowest not.
In order to arrive at that which thou possessest not, Thou must go by a way that thou possessest not.
In order to arrive at that which thou art not, Thou must go through that which thou art not.
12. When thy mind dwells upon anything,

Thou art ceasing to cast thyself upon the All. For, in order to pass from the all to the All, Thou hast to deny thyself wholly in all. And, when thou comest to possess it wholly, Thou must possess it without desiring anything. For, if thou wilt have anything in having all, Thou hast not thy treasure purely in God.

This is, admittedly, the unfortunate and awkward translation of E. Allison Peers, the one which many read and which leaves them utterly mystified--with good reason. The translation fails in most cases to be good English, much less a good translation from Spanish.

So, while it is awkward, I think the sense of it shines through. The point of the instruction is to cultivate a habit of mind in which these things predominate. We are called to the via negativa--which is denial of self--but NOT denial of creation. That is all created things are good, but many serve as obstruction on the path to union with God. Many natural goods start as resting points and then become sticking points. St. John of the Cross insists that the way around this is to take pleasure in nothing less than the presence of God himself. That doesn't mean to make yourself miserable to ascend the mount--at least I don't so interpret it. I read it more in line with Plato's cave of illusions. All created things are merely shadows and images of that which truly gives pleasure--so rather than chase after the shadow--chase after that which casts the shadow to achieve true happiness in Union.

I invite other comments, questions, challenges. I am by no means expert and stand to learn a great deal from the many who often comment here. What I say is NOT definitive, it is merely an attempt to make clear what I think the great teacher is saying, and by making it clear make it more probable that I shall put it into action in the near future.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:33 AM

April 30, 2003

Ascent of Mount Carmel Study Guide IV

I had not realized that I hadn't posted this last month. Tonight I'm working on Part V. Please use these if you find them worthwhile. Drop me a line to tell me how I might improve them.

Ascent of Mount Carmel IV

Read pages141-147 (chapters 11-12). In these chapters St. John of the Cross continues some of themes touched upon in earlier chapters. In addition, he introduces some new themes. Pay careful attention to Chapter titles and examples from scripture.

Chapter 11
What does John propose to address in this chapter? Why is that significant for the reader?

(1-2) Are all appetites equally damaging to the goal of union with God? If not which appetites are more to be avoided? Why?

(3) Read the second paragraph very carefully. What is John saying here and why is it important? What is the difference between an advertent imperfection and one that is inadvertent?

(4) List some examples of habitual imperfections according to John. Take a few minutes and pray that the Holy Spirit open your eyes and heart to habitual imperfections that assail you. Note these for future reference, prayer, and spiritual direction.

What do the examples of bird and the remora show us?

(5) Note particularly the second paragraph. What are the chief dangers of indulging "one small imperfection?"

(6-8) What does John use the examples from Judges and Joshua to show. How might his understandings help you to take better advantage of the richness of Scriptures?

Chapter 12
(1-3) Can any appetite produce the two sorts of evils we studied last time?

(5) What does John use the passage from Apocalypse to illustrate?

(6) How is this passage an important caution against scruples? To what problems might scruples give rise.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:56 PM

April 7, 2003

A Pertinent Passage of St. John of the Cross

May be found at Our Lady of Loretto Carmelite Chapel. (You'll have to scroll down for it). In it, St. John of the Cross traces the way of the discipline of detachment, something even those long in Carmel have great difficulty with. But Evelyn Underhill notes the following points concerning the mystics. "In an experience which often transcended all their powers of expression, they realized God as an abiding Fact, a living Presence and Love; and by this their whole existence was transformed. And this happened to them, not because He loved and attended to them more than He does to us; but because they loved and attended to Him more than we do."

And frankly, I'm tired of my own recalcitrance. It is time and long past that He should have His due from me; time to mortify the flesh and bring it into line with His will; time to become the saint He would have me be; time to realize or perhaps here the word is reify life in God. Otherwise all is wasted and worthless.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:46 AM

April 4, 2003

Ascent of Mount Carmel Study Guide IV

The Next Installment in the Study of Ascent of Mount Carmel

For those who have been following along, here's the next installment.

Ascent of Mount Carmel IV

Read pages141-147 (chapters 11-12). In these chapters St. John of the Cross continues some of themes touched upon in earlier chapters. In addition, he introduces some new themes. Pay careful attention to Chapter titles and examples from scripture.

Chapter 11
What does John propose to address in this chapter? Why is that significant for the reader?

(1-2) Are all appetites equally damaging to the goal of union with God? If not which appetites are more to be avoided? Why?

(3) Read the second paragraph very carefully. What is John saying here and why is it important? What is the difference between an advertent imperfection and one that is inadvertent?

(4) List some examples of habitual imperfections according to John. Take a few minutes and pray that the Holy Spirit open your eyes and heart to habitual imperfections that assail you. Note these for future reference, prayer, and spiritual direction.

What do the examples of bird and the remora show us?

(5) Note particularly the second paragraph. What are the chief dangers of indulging "one small imperfection?"

(6-8) What does John use the examples from Judges and Joshua to show. How might his understandings help you to take better advantage of the richness of Scriptures?

Chapter 12
(1-3) Can any appetite produce the two sorts of evils we studied last time?

(5) What does John use the passage from Apocalypse to illustrate?

(6) How is this passage an important caution against scruples? To what problems might scruples give rise?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:40 AM

February 27, 2003

Ascent of Mount Carmel Study Guide Part III

I have my doubts about the display on this one because of the table, but I think it will mostly make sense.

Anyone who would like a relatively readable copy, please e-mail me and I will send a worddoc.

St. John of the Cross
The Ascent of Mt. Carmel

Read pages 132-141, starting at section 5 of Chapter 6 on page 132. St. John of the Cross is describes how appetites produce certain effects in the soul. “For the appetites weary, torment, darken, defile, and weaken it [the soul]. The following passages deals with one or more of these effects. Use the chart to summarize information about the effects, symptoms (if any), how God treats it, and suggestions St. John of the Cross may have.

Effect Symptoms (or Signs)---- God’s Response---- St. John’s Advice
Weary Ch. 6--5-7
Torment-Ch 7--1-4
Darken(Blind) Ch 8--1-7
Defile Ch 9--1-7
Weaken Ch 10--1-4

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:57 PM

February 24, 2003

Christian Quote of the Day--so Apropos

Christian Quote of the Day--so Apropos

For this reason the apostle Paul said of Christ, "In him are hidden all the treasures of the wisdom and knowledge of God." The soul cannot enter into these treasures, nor attain them, unless it first crosses into and enters the thicket of suffering, enduring interior and exterior labors, and unless it first receives from God very many blessings in the intellect and in the senses, and has undergone long spiritual training.

The gate that gives entry into these riches of his wisdom is the cross; because it is a narrow gate, while many seek the joys that can be gained through it, it is given to few to desire to pass through it.

... from a spiritual canticle by John of the Cross (1542-1591)

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:23 AM

February 2, 2003

St. John of the Cross

St. John of the Cross

I have no profound and beautiful insights. I can share with you nothing of wisdom or kindness. And being in such a dragged out state (for whatever reason), it is perhaps better to let St. John of the Cross speak my mind.

from The Ascent of Mount Carmel--Book 1, Chapter 6 St. John of the Cross

4. Wherefore, if the soul rejects and denies that which it can receive through the senses, we can quite well say that it remains, as it were, in darkness and empty; since, as appears from what has been said, no light can enter it, in the course of nature, by any other means of illumination than those aforementioned. For, although it is true that the soul cannot help hearing and seeing and smelling and tasting and touching, this is of no greater import, nor, if the soul denies and rejects the object, is it hindered more than if it saw it not, heard it not, etc. Just so a man who desires to shut his eyes will remain in darkness, like the blind man who has not the faculty of sight. And to this purpose David says these words: Pauper sum ego, et in laboribus a indenture mea. Which signifies: I am poor and in labours from my youth. He calls himself poor, although it is clear that he was rich, because his will was not set upon riches, and thus it was as though he were really poor. But if he had not been really poor and had not been so in his will, he would not have been truly poor, for his soul, as far as its desire was concerned, would have been rich and replete. For that reason we call this detachment night to the soul, for we are not treating here of the lack of things, since this implies no detachment on the part of the soul if it has a desire for them; but we are treating of the detachment from them of the taste and desire, for it is this that leaves the soul free and void of them, although it may have them; for it is not the things of this world that either occupy the soul or cause it harm, since they enter it not, but rather the will and desire for them, for it is these that dwell within it.

These seem very difficult words indeed. And yet, I do not think they are as hard as we make them. John's way is a way of denial to obtain all. We do not latch onto the smaller pleasures of the senses and appetites, but we release them, deny them, and in so doing move forward to the greater pleasure of walking more closely with God, and then to the ultimate pleasure of union with God.

Now, of what does this denial consist? I do not think that it means that you do not see or hear things, but rather that you exercise a strict custody of what you do see and hear. A thing once seen cannot be unseen, a thing once heard cannot be unheard. Denial is first, denial of entry, and second, denail of a place in our heart. There are some things we should just forego. We know it and sometimes choose to indulge in those things anyhow. Other things are good a meritorious to have seen and heard, but they are not meritorious to linger over and to practice to the point of distraction from God. It is good to have seen the Leonides, it is not so good to spend six or seven hours a day recreating the Leonides in our own minds.

So denial is both about keeping some sensation out and about letting those things that do enter leave no trace upon us. Denial is, in some small part, an exercise of will. But as with all such exercises, they are ineffective without the participation of Divine Grace. (If the Lord does not build the house, then in vain do the builders labor). So we may start by exercising a kind of custody, but we must do this for the right reason--love of God. If we are practicing these things for our own sakes, then we are becoming attached to the very notion of denial. Detachment seems quite a tricky business until we realize that though it is entirely necessary, it is merely a means, not an end in itself. All is Grace and all is gift--if we lean upon the Lord, He will find a way.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 10:19 AM

February 1, 2003

A Parting Reminder--Then To My Meeting

from The Ascent of Mount Carmel--Book 1, Chapter 6 St. John of the Cross

IN order that what we have said may be the more clearly and fully understood, it will be well to set down here and state how these desires are the cause of two serious evils in the soul: the one is that they deprive it of the Spirit of God, and the other is that the soul wherein they dwell is wearied, tormented, darkened, defiled and weakened, according to that which is said in Jeremias, Chapter II: Duo mala fecit Populus meus: dereliquerunt fontem aquoe vivoe, et foderunt sibi cisternas, dissipatas, quoe continere non valent aquas. Which signifies: They have forsaken Me, Who am the fountain of living water, and they have hewed them out broken cisterns, that can hold no water.[117] Those two evils -- namely, the privative and the positive -- may be caused by any disordered act of the desire.

We seperate ourselves to God alone, or we struggle always against the crushing weight of desire and ownership. There is no middle way. God really, really likes the Frank Sinatra song, "All or nothing at All." I often hear Him say, "Half a love never appealed to me."

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:41 AM

January 31, 2003

Ascent of Mount Carmel II

In all humility, I offer these guiding questions for anyone for the benefit of any who can use them.

St John of the Cross
Study Guide for Ascent of Mount Carmel II

Read pages 123-122 Chapters 4-6. Be sure to annotate with your own heads. Numbers below refer to numbered sections of the text.

Chapter 4—Why you need to pass through a dark night of the senses to come to union with God.

1-2. Why are people attached to creatures unable to achieve union?
3 What does attachment to a creature cause to happen to a person?
4 John talks about being, beauty, grace and elegance, goodness, and wisdom and ability. What is his point in each case?
5 Compare and contrast the two paragraphs of this section. What must one do with human wisdom?
6-7 John continues his comparisons. Make a list of all the items John has compared and then note which of these is the cause of your greatest attachments. Which of these do you most prize?
8 What happens to souls in love with things of the world? Reflect for a while on the passages from Proverbs. Read it several times and write down what it says to you about people trying to grow close to God. Then read John’s explanation—how does it compare with yours?

Chapter 5—John offers biblical examples and further evidence for the necessity of the dark night of the senses..
1-2 John says over and over again, “Love produces equality and likeness.” Restate this in your own words. What do your attachments make you like?
3-4 What does the episode of manna in the desert mean in our lives? How are we like the Israelites? What do we need to do about it?
5-6 What is the chief lesson we are to gather from Moses on the Mount? What does it call us to do?
7 What is the purpose of ascending the mount? What must be accomplished for it to happen?
8 What happens to anything base that tries to dwell with God (for example the idol John mentions). What might be the effect in a soul of this? Would God do this to a soul? What implications does that have for us?

Chapter 6—The types of harm caused by attachments
1 What are the two forms of harm caused by attachments? (The word privative is an adjective meaning “depriving” or “causing one to lack.” What is the nature of this privative harm?
2 How can one add to an already full vessel? If something is filled to the very top, what must be done in order to add anything? If the substance being added is likely to destroy the vessel if it touches any of the previous substance, what must be done? What does this call us to?
3 How do appetites get in the way of the Lord?
4 What is more difficult for God creation or purgation? Why?
5-6 How is the soul wearing and tired by attachments and appetites? Name an example in your own life. What does this call us to?

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:52 AM

January 28, 2003

Recidivism: Beginning to Understand Mortification

One of the most difficult aspects of the spiritual life is our constant backsliding. Now while I'm sure I'm not alone in this, I do know that many who walk this road have progressed far beyond me and what I say here is largely irrelevant. But those of us who are beginning, or even who are a bit progressed find that time after time we commit the same errors or sins regardless of our desire not to do so.

The only good thing about this is that it shows we are human. St. Paul tells us concerning himself, "The Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak." Most of us who return to sin return to a sensual sense. That is the appeal to the pleasure principle is largely responsible for much backsliding. It only makes sense. If a sin causes pain, anguish, or mental difficulty, one is unlikely to repeat it over and over again. However, if a sin gives rise to some form of pleasure, be it gustatory, sexual, or otherwise, then we will be inclined to repeat the sin, not for the sake of sinning but for the sake of pleasure.

St. John of the Cross is always regarded as a very cold and austere Saint--one who might have supported various practices of mortification. In fact, he warned his adherents against excessive mortifications, and charted a road that is a model of moderation and caution in this regard. He pointed out the value of not allowing yourself to have something you greatly desire in order not to feed the fires of the passion that can lead to sin.

Practices of penance and mortification are good in small degree (so long as they do not become obsessions) in that they train us not to seek out the pleasures in life and to accept those pleasures that come without actively seeking them. When we experience a moment of pleasure at a sunset, a concert, or in any of the various activities of life, we should appreciate it and let it go. Mortification allows us to do this to greater degree. In some sense, we train our bodies to be more grateful and more appreciative of the good things that come to us. Fasting, for example, has numerous spiritual effects, but for those of proper frame of mind and prayer, one of the benefits is that it teaches us to be detached from the sensual pleasure accompanying food. This is not to say we should not enjoy the food we have, but we should not seek it out to the exclusion of all else.

In the document "Penitential Practices for Today's Catholics" mortification is described as

radical self-denial and wholehearted giving of oneself to God that Jesus called for when he told his disciples, "Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me" (Mt. 16:24). More specifically, mortification is a form of ascetic discipline that involves denial of some kind of enjoyment in order to gain greater detachment from one's desire. The goal of mortification is fullness of life, not death--freedom, not enslavement.

The word itself suggest dark, medieval practices from the "bad old days" of the Ancient Church. Monks with flagelli, etc. But it need not be so, and indeed, in some cases such practices carried things to such an extreme that mortification became an end in itself.

During Lent we are often called upon to "give something up." In modern Church discipline this "negative" approach has often been replaced with "doing something good." However, the discipline of giving something up, is very beneficial, and the proper practice of it can lead to lifelong spiritual benefits. If the point of the discipline is not simply to deprive oneself of a known good in order to be deprived but to use that deprivation to move closer to the Lord Jesus, "giving something up" can be a very good discipline indeed.

The long and the short of it--if you find yourself in a recidivist cycle, consult your spiritual director. Find out how to gradually increase your detachment from the object of desire, and use the whole practice to put yourself more thoroughly into the arms of our Savior and Lord.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:21 AM

January 15, 2003

Hearth and Home

Hearth and Home

After a brief sojourn in the spirited company of Mr. da Fiesole and St. Thomas at Disputations, I am glad to come home to St. John of the Cross--the familiar, the comfortable, and the comprehensible. I am in considerable awe of those who can derive more than intellectual stamina from the careful perusal of St. Thomas--it requires a makeup far different from mine. A sign of the great Grace of our Lord is the many mentors He has sent to us to serve the many different kinds of people that we are. St. Thomas, St. Francis, St. Benedict, St. Dominic, St. John of the Cross, St. Gaspar, and countless others all help those who seek God.

One of the reasons I am a Carmelite is that I have always enjoyed the gentle warmth and convivial company of St. John of the Cross, even when I don't completely understand all he is trying to tell me. Still, he always strikes me as a gentle father, ever patient but ever firm, allowing no deviation along the difficult road--a good and faithful aspect when you are ascending mountain paths without guardrails.

Returning to his company last evening, I took particular consolation (I know, I know, we're not be looking for consolations--but when they come, we can accept them) in this second paragraph of the Prologue.

from "Prologue" to The Ascent of Mount Carmel St. John of the Cross 2. Therefore, in order to say a little about this dark night, I shall trust neither to experience nor to knowledge, since both may fail and deceive; but, while not omitting to make such use as I can of these two things, I shall avail myself, in all that, with the Divine favour, I have to say, or at the least, in that which is most important and dark to the understanding, of Divine Scripture; for, if we guide ourselves by this, we shall be unable to stray, since He Who speaks therein is the Holy Spirit. And if aught I stray, whether through my imperfect understanding of that which is said in it or of matters uncollected with it, it is not my intention to depart from the sound sense and doctrine of our Holy Mother the Catholic Church; for in such a case I submit and resign myself wholly, not only to her command, but to whatever better judgment she may pronounce concerning it.

There is so much in this brief paragraph it is difficult to articulate it all. But ultimately what appeals to me here is the understanding of the limitations of human reason and experience in dealing with the things of God. While both are necessary and useful in their proper place, they are insufficient to give rise to the quality necessary for union with God. In fact, they become an obstacle to that Union if they are attachments. (Of this, I may speak from personal experience--how weak I am when I rely solely upon my intellect and experience.)

Any attachment, no matter how truly good the object, no matter how worthy the activity--this can mean an attachment to saying the Rosary, for example, or an attachment to praying before the blessed Sacrament--impede the progress of the soul in prayer. They do this because they are instances of disobedience, in a sense. God draws us on or in different directions, but we stubbornly adhere to our habits and our patterns.

Also here I see the great humility of a truly great mind that bows before the correction and teaching of Holy Mother Church, as indeed all the great Saints did and all the great heretics refused to do. It is wrong to insist upon your own way in any aspect of church life. For example, it is wrong to insist that one form of Mass is necessarily more holy and more complete than another. While our subjective experience may be better at one Mass than another, and while we may "feel" better, or recognize greater artistry and aesthetic appeal, if the form of Mass has been duly instituted by the Church and duly administered by the pastor, then we are in the presence of Jesus Christ in the Word and in the Eucharist. One Mass may seem to better honor Him, but He comes to us regardless of honor, still the Lamb of God, still the servant/master, still our Brother and our Lord.

Also, I see here the reliance on Holy Scripture inspired by the Holy Spirit and duly interpreted and understood in the context of the teaching of the Church, as a wonderful, salutary habit. Too often we rely upon our own resources. Even if we do not fully understand scripture (and there is no one on Earth who encompasses all the meanings and all the variations of scripture in their person) we can ask the Holy Spirit for guidance and read in His presence--all redounding to our benefit--so much so, in fact, that in the general grants of plenary indulgences, the active reading of scripture for at least one-half hour is one of three activities that can merit such an indulgence. More, the Church is so certain of the value of reading scripture that such a indulgence may be received once a day.

St. John of the Cross teaches us even when the intent is not so much to teach but explain. His Prologue, intending merely to outline the path up the slopes of Mount Carmel, actually sets the stage for much of what is to come. It encourages the habits necessary for the ascent, and it begins to instill in us the real desire to make the whole trek.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:03 AM

November 11, 2002

How to Read St. John of the Cross

How to Read St. John of the Cross
Part I: The Poem Introduction to Ascent of Mount Carmel

The Dark Night
St. John of the Cross

Songs of the soul that rejoices in having reached the high state of perfection, which is union with God, by the path of spiritual negation.

1. One dark night,
fired with love's urgent longings
- ah, the sheer grace! -
I went out unseen,
my house being now all stilled.

2. In darkness, and secure,
by the secret ladder, disguised,
- ah, the sheer grace! -
in darkness and concealment,
my house being now all stilled.

3. On that glad night
in secret, for no one saw me,
nor did I look at anything
with no other light or guide
than the one that burned in my heart.

4. This guided me
more surely than the light of noon
to where he was awaiting me
- him I knew so well -
there in a place where no one appeared.

5. O guiding night!
O night more lovely than the dawn!
O night that has united
the Lover with his beloved,
transforming the beloved in her Lover.

6. Upon my flowering breast,
which I kept wholly for him alone,
there he lay sleeping,
and I caressing him
there in a breeze from the fanning cedars.

7. When the breeze blew from the turret,
as I parted his hair,
it wounded my neck
with its gentle hand,
suspending all my senses.

8. I abandoned and forgot myself,
laying my face on my Beloved;
all things ceased; I went out from myself,
leaving my cares
forgotten among the lilies.

First, it seems ridiculous, but we must recall the genre. This is poetry. You cannot assume that the "I" speaking is the poet. The "I" of the poem may or may not be the poet himself. It depends upon the type of poem and the author. For example, the "I" of the confessional poet is almost always the poet, but much of the time the first person is an invitation to read substituting yourself for the "I" of the poem.

Here St. John makes the interpretation somewhat easier by announcing his intent at the beginning of the poem. " Songs of the soul that rejoices in having reached the high state of perfection, which is union with God, by the path of spiritual negation. " From this follows two points. The "I" of the poem is the soul transported and this eight-part poem is not a single song. The stanzas do not flow one into the other but they constitute a number of songs. However, there need not be eight. One reading of the poem, the one I shall pursue here, would find two different songs--stanzas 1 through 5 which all seem bound by a common thread and stanzas 5 or 6 through 8. Stanza 5 seems pivotal and its importance is signaled by language that very much resembles liturgical language. Something about it suggests the Exultet of Easter.

Most blessed of all nights, chosen by God to see Christ rising from the dead!

Of this night scripture says:
"The night will be as clear as day:
it will become my light, my joy."

The power of this holy night
dispels all evil, washes guilt away,
restores lost innocence, brings mourners joy;
it casts out hatred, brings us peace, and humbles earthly
pride.

Night truly blessed when heaven is wedded to earth
and man is reconciled with God!

Earlier in the Exultet we find the line concerning the night in which the pillar of fire led the people out of bondage.

It seems that central to St. John's point is this stanza, that is why I could see it associated with both "songs." By his language St. John of the Cross refers directly to the central event in the Christian Experience. This is the pivot upon which the entire spiritual life turns. Thus you could view stanza 5 as ending one song and beginning another. Try reading the poem as two songs--the first a song of a person leaving their still house driven by the search for the beloved, the second a song of the loved and the beloved together in union.

We are still left to pursue the understanding of the poem. St. John of the Cross ostensibly wrote two books explicating the poem (although Ascent leaves the poem fairly early on and only Dark Night of the Soul visits the entire poem.

One other important point to remember about the poem, is that as with all spiritual poetry when you read it, you mustn't merely look for the authorial intent--you need to plumb the depths and see what it is saying to you. You need to become the "I" of the poem. Because this "I" is female, such a reading is at surface somewhat more difficult for men than for women. It is very difficult to put yourself in the place of the female of the poem until you remember that in God's embrace all souls are "female." This has less to do with sex than it has to do with the role and response defined in classical terms of the female to the male. Modern sensibilities have often brushed this aside, but the meaning of this poem can only be captured in that classical understanding. The soul is bending, yielding, and fruitful under God's ministrations. When reading the poem set aside your modern sensibilities and accept the notion of the time during which the poem was written.

As with all poems read it, reread it, and read it aloud. If you understand Spanish, seek it out in Spanish and read it aloud. Let the music and the rhythm of the poem have their proper place.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:39 AM

September 18, 2002

More Wisdom from St. John

More Wisdom from St. John of the Cross

This short excerpt from his letters provides us with a glimpse into heaven.

Letter 3
St. John of the Cross

[To Madre Ana de San Alberto, prioress of Caravaca7

Granada, 1582]

...since you say nothing to me, I tell you not to be foolish and not to walk with fears that intimidate your soul. Return to God what he has given you and gives you each day. It seems you want to measure God by the measure of your own capacity, but it will not be so. Prepare yourself, for God desires to grant you a great favor.

There are two things I love about this letter--it's straightforward simplicity and its firm direction. "Return to God what he has given you and gives you each day." That is, don't store it up and plan to return it at some other time. Don't hoard the treasures God showers on you. Every day as you receive, give out. As you are blessed, bless those around you. As God graces you, let the graces flow through you and out to grace the entire world. In a small sense, I suppose, we are all distributors of God's grace, we all act in miniature as the Blessed Mother. People who are ignorant of Christ can be blessed and "graced" by us. The starving, the thirsty, the poor, the downtrodden, even the merely sad or grieving can be lifted up by the spirit of Christ within us and graced by the same Holy Spirit--if we choose to allow it. Mother Teresa was a prime example of someone whose very presence lifted up God's people, because she gave back to Him, in the persons of all those around her, all that she received in a day.

The second wonderful moment in this brief letter is, "It seems you want to measure God by the measure of your own capacity," this is powerful beyond words, and true for every one of us. We, most unconsciously, put limits on what God can accomplish. We are not big enough, so God cannot do what is needed. We are so inelastic, so inflexible, so rigidly set, that we restrict the channels of grace through which God may work. If you recall Jesus could do no miracles in His own home town, "A prophet is without honor in his own country." This is not because He could not work miracles, but the stubborn unbelief and inflexibility of the inhabitants restricted God's action. He will not force us to accept any of His gifts. He may plead, cajole, and offer, but He will not force. So, if we measure God by the narrow margins of our own human hearts, we are casting out the wonderful possibilities inherent in His grace, because God came not to fit into the narrow boundaries of the heart, but to expand our hearts into His own. For that we need to accept the radical necessity for a fundamental change in our outlooks.

And we are told, "Prepare yourself for God desires to grant you a great favor." What greater favor could there be than to replace our stony hearts with hearts of flesh (to quote Ezekiel, I think)? What greater favor than to take away our human limitations to love and replace them with His own love? In so doing, He removes our self-involvement, our self-centeredness, our fear. We must cooperate in this work, we must prepare ourselves. We do so through the sacraments, through prayer, and through actions in the world that let God speak to others. We do so in putting ourselves aside and "putting on Christ." We do so whenever we break out of ourselves enough to breathe the air of heaven and when we use that to change the world in which we live, be it ever so slightly. When we smile at someone who has grown accustomed to our scowl, when we wave at someone to thank them as we drive our cars, when we share a cup of coffee, or listen to someone who desperately needs an ear. All of these things, small though they seem, prepare the way of the Lord.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:01 AM

September 16, 2002

Hallmarks of a Beginner in Prayer

This is from a study of the works of St. John of the Cross available at ICS (see left column).

from The Contemporary Challenge of St. John of the Cross--Chapter 4 Leonard Doohan

The pride of beginners leads to spiritual avarice. Their attachment and possessiveness of heart centers on "hearing counsels," "learning spiritual maxims," and accumulating religious objects. Nowadays, for example, this spiritual avarice can lead beginners to an attendance at innumerable prayer workshops, the needless accumulation of books on prayer, and the constant comfort and consolation of ever longer retreats and workshops.
*****
Spiritual gluttony is also a common failing of beginners. Some manifest spiritual gluttony in seeking only the comfort, consolation, and satisfaction that involvement in the spiritual life can bring. "All their time is spent looking for satisfaction and spiritual consolation" (N, 1, 6, 6).

Two other weaknesses follow from those already mentioned, namely spiritual envy and sloth. Beginners often become dissatisfied with the comfort they experience and are envious at anyone else's spiritual growth. Moreover, emphasis on the consolations that sometimes accompany the early stages of spiritual growth leads beginners to a distaste for the unpleasant sacrifices needed to advance. "Because of their sloth, they subordinate the way of perfection...to the pleasure and delight of their own will" (N, 1, 7, 3).

The cryptic numberings simply refer you to the correlated sections of Dark Night of the Soul. What I find most interesting here is the pattern I have observed in myself. I used to spend a tremendous amount of time poring over all the new spiritual books and guides and looking for the latest in self-help prayer books. I still spend far more time than may be helpful doing the same. I have longed to attend workshops and retreats on prayer and have attended an extended (32 week) Ignatian Retreat. All of these things convict me. And yet, when I settle down with the Bible or with St. John of the Cross, this impulse seems to fade away. I haven't scoured shelves in months. Now I look at all those things I've accumulated and wonder why I ever thought the book was useful.

One of the more important things indicated in the passage is the "wrong reason" for mysticism. Many people undertake the prayer of St. John and St. Teresa for the consolation involved--the feeling that they are becoming connected to God. While consolations are wonderful gifts that should be accepted and appreciated, both St. John and St. Teresa note that the consolation should be forgotten as soon as it passes--that consolations, be they visions, locutions, levitations, simply good feelings of accomplishment, should be let go as soon as they are apprehended. One should not dwell on these minor things that are to feed the faltering soul. The reason for prayer is far beyond mere consolation, and pausing there causes you to lose the momentum toward your ultimate destination--Love.

Now, I've not had a whole lot of consolations in prayer, but as I've indicated, I am probably not even truly a beginner--I'm standing in the vestibule and timorously approaching the somewhat daunting oak doors that seal me off from true prayer and reflection. But I have had a few, and unfortunately, part of what happens--without willing it, is a feeling of accomplishment as though one had achieved some sort of status in the prayer world. As soon as that creeps in a sort of spiritual pride begins to take form and take over. The only cure--acknowledge the phenomenon and confess it.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:08 AM

September 5, 2002

Mere Surfaces and Sensations

or What Would You Expect from a Carmelite Follower of St. John of the Cross? :-) [Do these blogs have smileys?]
Luis remarks in the comment box below:

We need not apologize that we have a body or throw away its usefulness in pointing to THE Beauty. Just as creation points to our God, let our churches do so, while understanding of course that beauty is in the eye of the beholder to some extent.

My thanks to Luis who has given me the chance and the impetus to clarify my thoughts. I just realized looking over the original what I seem to saying is not what I intended. I was trying to gently say that it is perhaps better not to criticize buildings that do not suit our taste. I apologize for the misunderstanding. Obviously the original context and the language caused me to be overly vague. I do not think that everything should be ugly to accentuate worship, and reading my post, it certainly does sound like that was what I was saying. Once again, my apologies form misspeaking. My point here is a good deal more subtle than the overly blunt language makes it. I was trying, without faulting anyone, to say that we do everyone a disservice when we emphasize aesthetics over Real Presence. Many people are stuck with the Church they have, there is no real viable alternative for them. How are they helped if their Church is held up as an example of an "unfortunate Church?"

There is absolutely nothing wrong with beauty in a worship space. There is nothing wrong with building beautiful churches. I do, however, find something wrong with posting pictures of "unfortunate churches" or "ugly churches." Comments on the aesthetic merit of any edifice can potentially distract the faithful from the most beautiful thing of all--what happens within the building. Beauty is wonderful if it is available, but if not, do we build up the Body of Christ by pointing out how ugly we deem the Church some must go to?

Thanks to Luis and my anonymous poster for pointing out how much my previous post had missed the real point I was trying to make. I do not think, however that I will change either the post below nor the one on Ms. Welborn's blog, as I don't really want to criticize anyone in so many words. I just abjure all to remember that every such comment does potential damage to large numbers of people, and it isn't really worth it.

(On the other hand, I stand by the orginal post. St. John of the Cross teaches that a thing is good insofar as it leads to God and that even a very good, very holy, very religious thing becomes destructive when it stands in the way of our progress toward union. If the appearance of a Church becomes a true impediment to Union with Jesus Christ, it is time to examine priorities. But then--I am a Carmelite and not everyone follows the same way--it is a distinctive mark of Carmelite Spirituality. God Bless you all!)

Posted by Steven Riddle at 4:41 PM

August 6, 2002

On Vocation

On Vocation

I have written a number of posts reflecting on St. John of the Cross and the Carmelite way, and I was getting a bit despondent at the lack of interest and/or discussion they seemed to provoke. But as I was reflecting on this I realized several things, the most important of which I shall share.

The lack of response isn't due to a lack of readership, but it is due to the nature of vocation. Some may stop by and read an endless blog on detachment and say--"What's his problem?" or "What was that all about?" Others may stop and read and find it perfectly clear and have no comment. Yet others may stop by and say, "And that means what to me?" All are legitimate responses. What it points out to me, is that vocation really is a gift from God.

From as early as I can remember in my spiritual life, I have had the desire to be as close to God as I possibly could--to "climb inside" God and not come out. Through a tortured path of mistakes, poor discernment, and God's Grace, I finally found my way to the Third Order of Carmel. Previously I had read some of St. John of the Cross and realized that what he was talking about was exactly what I wanted. I remember a discussion with my wife before we bought our first house. She was talking excitedly about how great it would be to "own" a house, and all I could think about, with serious dread, was the prospect of a house now "owning" me. It was yet another thing to care for and take time away from what really mattered.

All along, God has been calling me to detachment, to a gentle movement toward Him. I have moved ever so slowly. But as I said in a teaching to my Carmelite Community last week, "Three steps forward and two steps back is still a step in the right direction." My ascent of Mt. Carmel may take me the rest of my life (of course it will--that too is the nature of vocation), but at least God has granted me a sense of what I am doing, and some reliable saintly guides as to how to go about it. Both of these are great treasures that God in His mercy has seen fit to grant me. And so, because He has also shown me this way, I would like to share them as much as possible; therefore, lack of comment is no object. We must recognize why we do things, reject the human rationalizations and desires, and do what we do solely for the love of God.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:29 PM

August 5, 2002

Sayings of Light and Love

Sayings of Light and Love

John of the Cross wrote a series of very short aphorisms meant to instruct the Carmelite Religious of his time. These short sayings are very much like the sayings of the desert fathers in that they pack a lot of meaning or intent into a very small space. They are great for meditation starters, or in series for an intense lectio.

20. God is more pleased by one work, however small, done secretly, without desire that it be known, than a thousand done with the desire that people know of them. Those who work for God with purest love not only care nothing about whether others see their works, but do not even seek that God himself know of them. Such persons would not cease to render God the same services, with the same joy and purity of love, even if God were never to know of these.

This demonstrates one of the primary themes of St. John of the Cross--seeking nothing, letting go of all desire and of all attachments. This detachment is a necessary stage in growth toward unity with God. After detachment comes purification (the variously described "Dark Nights"). But detachment is the first rule. In order to achieve union with God one must be detached from everything less than God. The other day a person interested in becoming a Carmelite asked me, "Does that include your children?" And my answer, immediately, was, "Of course."

But you need to understand what detachment is and what it is not. Many people confuse detachment with indifference. They are not the same. An person who is detached is able to calmly and carefully care for a child or another person who has just fallen and may have broken a limb. An indifferent person looks upon the same spectacle with the attitude that it is all part of the rich pageant of life, and then goes inside to pour him- or herself a beer.

Detachment is the ability to let everything go into the good that God has prepared for His entire creation. Detachment from one's children means loving them, guiding them, bringing them up in the way they should go, lavishing care and concern on them, but not seeking to control every action of their lives; you need to be there as guardian, guide, and advisor, and then you need to trust them confidently to God's loving care when it comes time for them to make their own choices.

True detachment delivers the object to the infinite care of Almighty God, understanding that we are incapable of even a microscopic fraction of the care and love God lavishes upon each of His Children. In the parlance of one group, detachment is "Letting go and letting God." But it really is--rather than just being a cute slogan. Detachment is a source of enormous peace, because you are no longer burdened with the need to control everyone and everything around you. Detachment is not cold, it is passionate, loving, caring, and deeply intimate. It shows far greater love than any other action we can take, because we turn the object of our concern over to the Infinite source of Love and all concern. We trust our most loved people and things to the One who can most love them--God.

More on John of the Cross as we go along.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:58 PM

July 28, 2002

And Now My Meae Culpae

And Now My Meae Culpae
OR, why I don't often comment on events and people

Every time, every single time, I'm given some reminder. Here's today's--from St. John of the Cross, Sayings of Light and Love

62. Because the virtues you have in mind do not shine in your neighbor, do not think that your neighbor will not be precious in God's sight for reasons that you have not in mind.

69. You will without labor subject the nations and bring things to serve you if you forget them and yourself as well.

109. Wisdom enters through love, silence, and mortification. It is great wisdom to know how to be silent and to look at neither the remarks, nor the deeds, nor the lives of others.

116. The entire world is not worthy of a human being's thought, for this belongs to God alone; any thought, therefore, not centered on God is stolen from him.

118. Ignoring the imperfections of others, preserving silence and a continual communion with God will eradicate great imperfections from the soul and make it the possessor of great virtues.

Oh well, caught and convicted again! It's a good thing I have a great attorney and advocate in Jesus Christ!

Posted by Steven Riddle at 11:24 AM

July 22, 2002

Sayings of Light and Love:

Sayings of Light and Love: I

In a series of very short maxims*, St. John of the Cross attempted to leave those he advised with some guidance as they continued in the life of prayer. The Sayings of Light and Love is a collection of all the known maxims that can be shown definitively to be by St. John of the Cross. I have chosen the first of these sayings to share today because it is particularly appropriate to the present situation in the Church. However, it is important to note that it is equally important to both the church and to individuals at almost any given time.

1. The Lord has always revealed to mortals the treasures of his wisdom and his spirit, but now that the face of evil bares itself more and more, so does the Lord bare his treasures more.

Throughout church history people could have found use for this simple reminder. In the face of the "crisis" of the Church we face in America today (can there truly be a "crisis" if we know "The gates of hell shall not prevail against it?") we see a great outpouring of people at once condemning the truly terribly nature of the crimes, and yet supporting the Church (in the sense of the Mystical Body of Christ--the signpost of His Divine Establishment). Of course the excision of a cancerous lesion is always traumatic to the body as a whole, but there can be no healing until it is removed. Whether we all agree on the course and the fashion of this removal is incidental, I think all agree that no allowance can be made for those who prey upon the weakest and most disenfranchised. I tremble when I think about Jesus among the children, "Suffer the little children to come unto me and forbid them not, for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven. (Matt 19:14)" (I believe that there is another quote perhaps more to the point regarding "A millstone around his neck.") If so, what happens to one who leads a child astray? All such need our strongest and most ardent prayers and disapproval of their conduct. They need the healing love of the Holy Catholic Church, but they must not be allowed to wreak further havoc upon it.

The simple phrase of John of the Cross reminds us that Christ is ever nearer in time of trial. And we are also reminded of the words of our Savior, "And you will hear of wars and rumors of war. (Matt. 24:6)" In other words, every time is traumatic in its own way. If we are not seeing the church rent from the inside, we see persecutions outside. It helps at all times to recall the words of Paul, "In my weakness is His strength." So too with the body of the Church. Christ strengthens it with those who come out as prayer warriors, intent on enlisting in the supernatural battle that rages around us at all times. "For we are not contending against flesh and blood but against. . .the world rulers of this present darkness (Eph 6:12)."

The truths St. John of the Cross chooses to share with us are not the fruit of mere human wisdom. They are the profound fruit of intimate knowledge of the gospel and close communion with Our Lord Himself. St. John can show us a clear way to Jesus if we can clear away enough of the brush of our own uncertainties and doubts. The ultimate destiny of every Christian is to be a saint. Better for us all if more can accomplish this during their time on Earth.

* Note from above--after following the link, look in the archives, then look in The Collected Works of St. John of the Cross for Sayings of Light and Love.

Shalom.

Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:15 PM