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Brookline Carmel Bulletin J M J T
November 22, 1959
Cogitatio Sancta
(Holy
Meditation)
Passages for Meditation
from St. John of the Cross
“God does not permit anything to dwell with Him (in the soul)…
He only permits and wills that there should be one desire where He is, which is
to keep the law of God perfectly, and to bear upon oneself the cross of Christ.” “This
state (of union) is the making of two wills into one – namely into the will of
God… If this soul desires any imperfection that God does not will, there will
not be one will of God…” “He that will love some other thing
together with God certainly makes little account of God, for he weighs in the
balance against God something that is far removed from Him.” “Some
habits of voluntary imperfections which are never completely conquered
prevent not only the attainment of Divine union, but even progress in
perfection. These habitual
imperfections are, for example, a common habit of speaking too much, or some
slight attachment which we never quite wish to conquer – such as to a person, a
piece of clothing, a book, a cell, a particular kind of food, gossip, etc…” Many souls fail to make progress “because
they have not shaken off some childish thing which God has bidden them conquer
for love of Him, and which is nothing more than a thread or a hair.” “Upon
this road we must ever journey in order to attain our goal; which means that we
must ever be mortifying our desires and not indulging them; and if they are not
all completely mortified (i.e., brought under control – not necessarily
deadened), we shall not completely attain it.”
“Counsels whereby the soul may know how to enter this night of sense:
(1)
First, let him have an habitual desire to imitate
Christ in everything that he does, conforming himself to His life; upon which
life he must meditate so that he may know how to imitate it, and to behave in
all things as Christ would behave. (Prayer).
(2)
Secondly, in order that he may be able to do this well,
every pleasure that presents itself to the sense, if it be not purely for the
honor and glory of God, must be renounced and completely rejected, for the love
of Jesus Christ…” (Mortification).
“I wish to propose a test
whereby it may be determined when these pleasures of the senses aforementioned
are profitable (i.e., for the honor and glory of God) and when they are
not. And it is this: whenever a person hears music and other
things, and sees pleasant things, and is conscious of sweet perfumes, or tastes
things that are delicious, or feels something soft, if his thoughts and
affections are immediately centered upon God, and if the thought of God gives
him more pleasure than the sensual satisfaction which causes it… this is a sign
that he is receiving benefit therefrom, and that this thing of sense is a help
to his spirit. In this way such things
may be used, for then such things of sense subserve the end for which God
created and gave them, which is that He should be better loved and known
because of them.” “Whatever pleasure
presents itself to the spiritual person, and whether it comes to him by chance
or by design, he must make use of it only as a means to God, lifting up to God
the joy his soul experiences…”
“Faith produces in the intellect emptiness and obscurity of the understanding…because it tells us of things which we cannot penetrate with our understanding. Hope voids the memory of all possession, because hope always has for its object that which we do not yet possess, and charity voids the will and strips it of all affection and pleasure in anything that is not God…because it obliges us to love God above all things; which cannot be achieved, except by stripping the affection of them in order to fix it solely on God.” “The farther thou withdrawest from earthly things, the nearer dost thou approach heavenly things, and the more thou findest in God.”
“More pleasing to God is one good work, howsoever small it be, that is done in secret with no desire that it shall be known, than a thousand that are done with the desire that they may be known by men.” “One single thought of a man is of greater worth than the whole world; wherefore God alone is worthy of it.”
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