Exhaling

Comment by Carol

April 26, 2007 @ 1:45 pm

Let’s start where I’m comfortable: at the bottom!
“(Contemplation is)Not only a personal union of souls with Him, but a communion in the one great act by which He conquered death once and for all in His Death and Resurrection.”

We share in that one great act, too — not simply observe it. I know that Baptism is a dying to original sin, and a rising in His redeemed life, and there is no doubt we share in His pre-Passion Passion.. all the crucifying and suffering, o Lord, yes.. and we do share in His dying more than symbolically, if the old man dies and the new man lives in us, and in/with/through Christ we shall rise… but this says something deeper than I usually think of it, something about being There..with Him? at that Moment? Even more than was good thief Dismas? Help me unfuzzy it, please.

Comment by kathryntherese

April 27, 2007 @ 8:21 am

Well, as these things must, in this life anyway, remain somewhat fuzzy (until we know as we are known, see as we are seen - ah! glory!), all we can do is ruminate… like good sheep.

If we are “sons in the Son,” then we are ever with Him. And He ever holds us in His Heart. This could spin off into a discussion of the Mystical Body, but for now I’ll just remind us all of the fact that all are ONE - we in Him, He in us, the Father in Him, He in the Father, and all things will be brought “into one in him,” and there will be “one Christ loving Himself.” (h/t St. Augustine)

So that He redeemed us by making us part of HimSELF, and He willed this and knew this and held us each in His Heart at every moment, including the moment of our redemption. We are there.

But to make this efficacious (for lack of a better word) for us, we must freely choose to participate, by making this act ours. He invites us to participate in our own redemption (and the salvation of others) by “inserting” our own little sufferings into His own suffering and death. We lay all at the foot of the Cross, bringing it to Mass and offering with the other gifts at the altar, and all is united with His supreme Gift to the Father.

Short on time, long on thoughts right now. But maybe this is more than enough to chew on, fellow flock members.

Comment by Gabrielle

April 28, 2007 @ 12:26 am

This has always been one of my favourite passages from The New Man. When Merton says that with contemplation “life, reality and God cease to be concepts and become realities in which we consciously participate”, to me it speaks of our movement in contemplation from faith to “knowing”.

Comment by Carol

April 28, 2007 @ 12:36 pm

Yes. And that can only be Infused, yes?

Comment by kathryntherese

April 28, 2007 @ 1:24 pm

Well, Gabrielle is the resident expert at describing the details and subtleties of these states (such as “acquired” vs. “infused” contemplation), so I’ll defer to her on the technical stuff

But yes, only God can draw us to that place near Him where we see with new eyes; where we hear the Voice to which our sin had made us deaf; where we run with new legs, new strength to carry us where we could not go in our weakness, crippled by our sin and self-will.
Only He can transition us “from faith to ‘knowing’” (as Gabrielle put it) because Truth is Himself. Only He can give us Himself.

It is our participation in Him - in the very love-life of the Trinity - and His living IN US that makes all we believe “real”. When we begin to consciously allow Him to live in us and we perceive that what we do is done IN GOD, we are truly walking new, walking in the glow of the Resurrection.

But only He can do that. All we can do is reach, open ourselves, prove our goodwill by rejecting all that is contrary to Him. But the work is all His.

I’ve not read more than excerpts of Merton (shame on me; it would be good for me, I know), but you’ve put that on my mental reading list again, ladies.

Comment by Gabrielle

April 28, 2007 @ 4:57 pm

Well, sometimes it is not good, or necessary, to get bogged down in all the ‘technical’ stuff in comboxes or even in posts, unless it is one’s specific intent to be teaching about it, because it interrupts and impedes the flow of what is being expressed. Here I am just feeling rather relieved that you both understand what I’m talking about, re from faith to knowing. Sometimes I find myself wondering what the role of faith is, after one has had direct experience of God and has, as kt said, made a “transition” to knowing. I have found this a little difficult to talk about with anyone, for fear of sounding like I no longer believed in the theological virtue of faith, which is not the case.

Comment by Carol

April 29, 2007 @ 12:57 am

Merton speaks directly into my adrenal glands. Sorta. Jesuits are instant brother-friends/fathers, but Merton’s monkish molecules come laughing over and meld with mine.

Yes, Kathryn.. as He said, “I chose you. You did not choose Me.”

When I came home from work tonight, the little guy was still awake and suddenly, now, had to lay down with “Mama” (Grandma.. he has similar trouble with Grandpa, which comes out as “Papa,”) and it’s always amazing to lie down with him, because sometimes he looks behind him to see if I’m awake or sleeping, and through half closed eyes, I see his dimples appear in a smile. Sometimes he just reaches back one hand very gently to touch my face and rub my hair. As I looked at his dimples tonight, I also looked just above them across the room to a portrait of The Crucified, praying, and I knew in that moment that He was not only here, but was indeed praying. I hope I said what I’m trying to say..but it was a powerful moment of mutual love.

Comment by kathryntherese

April 29, 2007 @ 7:56 am

Carol, that is beautiful. Christ everywhere, Christ in us, around us, through us. And for me, He is so often more visible in those little ones.

As for speaking about faith, Gabrielle, I think I understand your difficulty - our words are frail wrapping for some things, and tend to hold some ideas rather loosely. I think of Teresa of Avila so often saying that her words might sound exaggerated, but those who had experienced these things would understand. So true. To others, they could not make so much sense.

Our words could be misunderstood by some to mean something we do not intend, as you pointed out.

I think that some of this difficulty, at least regarding this kind of discussion, is assuaged by acknowledging that no matter how clearly we come to “know” in this life, God is always unknowable and is wholly “Other.” So that no matter how easy it seems for us to believe at any given time (right now, for you and for me, I think I can safely say that our faith is secure, that we have no shadow of doubt about God’s existence or love for us, that no evangelizing zealot for any other idea of God could interest us or make us question our faith), we are never beyond the virtue of faith, which God could allow to be tested even at this secure point. So that what we once felt that we “took on faith” but now we “know”, so to speak, is still not knowing in the real sense. In this life, it is still faith because we believe (with every fiber of our being) in what we cannot see. So even though we use the word “knowing” and we really have changed and really do grasp at a deeper level than before, we still acknowledge that it is a deeper faith, not a “knowing as we are known.”

I think of Therese’s struggle with faith towards the end of her life. She had definitely reached an intimacy with God, yet He allowed her to be tried in this way. And Mary, for all her personal knowledge of Christ, is still the “Woman of faith” because she believed.

So we are not negating faith at any point, but rejoicing that God allows us to know Him, in faith.

Whew! Too much coffee this morning? Mea culpa…

Comment by Gabrielle

April 29, 2007 @ 11:35 pm

No, no, I see exactly what you mean kt, especially re the testing. Thank you.

Comment by Carol

April 30, 2007 @ 11:57 am

I am sure we can know the Lord here in this life, else His risen humanity is a moot point until we, too, rise beyond the clay once and for all. We won’t know God fully here, right.. but we can and to a degree do know Him. Know Him not by what we’re told, or what we believe or trust, but by His knowing us. It is not our doing. There can be no Love affair unto inner or outer martrydom without that.

Comment by Ann

April 30, 2007 @ 1:31 pm

Just ‘ registering’ as an ‘other side of the pond’ blogger, following the discussion here with much interest. Thanks and God bless, Ann

Comment by kathryntherese

April 30, 2007 @ 3:04 pm

Welcome, Ann. Glad you found us. We will patiently wait for you to jump in and add your own thoughts.

Carol, you are right in saying that we CAN know Him, but our knowing is still in faith. We know His Voice, we know we are known. But blessed are we who have not seen and yet believe. Hearing His Voice still takes faith, I think.

But I don’t want to get too far from Gabrielle’s thought that by saying we “know,” people might misunderstand and think that we “no longer believe in the theological virtue of faith.”

Truthfully, this discussion probably isn’t necessary here where we are all striving to know, love and serve Him and find our joy in His will. We are on the same page, I think. But it’s always interesting to pursue these thoughts (at least, I find it interesting) and discover what fine distinctions, what subtleties, we uncover in the process. It takes my own mind into corners I’d never needed to investigate before.

One of the many reasons I love you people.

Comment by Carol

April 30, 2007 @ 4:06 pm

I dunno… it seems that to say “we only know Him in the faith,” is to say there is no infused prayer of His. It seems it is also to say we do not encounter Him in creation, in beauty, in music, in each other — except to the degree of faith. Lately, I am encountering His mottled flesh, His fungused fingernails, His toothless smile, His bedridden hipbones, His deeply-seeing Eyes searching mine. And mine are finally looking back, begging for more inner whitening and widening, for the sake of all whom We love.

I’d been misled by supposed limitedness for a very long time; if it is His will to be known, and if it’s our will to say, “Of course!,” then it happens: we are freed like a spouse-to-be into the grilles and abbey walls that spring up (inside), like new wineskins.

Yes, believing what we’ve not yet seen is faith. But there is also His desire to be Known right now, right here, to be considered. The Eucharist is not simply food or medicine. It is the Lord! We cannot know Him by will and Scripture alone, nor even by Eucharist and all the sacraments alone.. but He can arrange a Knowing.

It seems to me that when the Spouse-to-be is utterly holy, there is suddenly no limit for Us, except the clay which carries the memory of a washed stain. If I could attribute that betrothal to anything of my doing or to any teaching alone, I’d be out on the river teaching stones to not only shout but to walk.

Comment by kathryntherese

April 30, 2007 @ 9:07 pm

He does indeed reveal Himself in the beautiful and tangible ways you described, Carol. He is everywhere, and we can know Him if we are open. But still, this is not “knowing” like we know other things, or this would be Heaven.

I was a bit behind on my Magnificat meditations, and today I read this (from last Thursday), which speaks to our point (from Blessed Angela of Foligno):

Elevated out of itself into God, (the soul) can see him who is invisible, know him who is unknowable, feel him who is imperceptible, comprehend him who is incomprehensible. And this is so because the soul sees, knows, feels, and comprehends God as invisible light, incomprehensible, and unknown good.Comprehending, seeing, knowing, and feeling God, the soul expands in him and becomes filled with him through love… The soul experiences and possesses God’s sweetness more from what it does not comprehend than from what it comprehends, more from what it does not see than from what it sees, more from what it does not feel than from what it feels, more from what it does not know than from what it knows… No matter how perfect the soul, it comprehends nothing of God…From looking at what it sees, feels, and knows, it sees, feels, and knows that it cannot see, feel, and know…

Comment by Carol

May 1, 2007 @ 10:33 am

Yes! And that is tremendously exciting! Just one second of His reality, His life, is astounding — changes everything!

And the NonKnowingYetButKnowing is exactly why it’s not incongruous to also liken (my)self to a donkey, a beast of burden Invited to breathe warmly on (by!) a tiny Saviour whose scent is beyond sweet in this nasty stall offered His poor holy Mother, our fallen life to which He descended in order to transform, redeem, gather and raise up royal children of God in Him. What do I know of Him?

Truly, to grasp even a minute portion of what has been done for us by GOD, is to strike one dumb. Yet, even all created worlds must point to Him–I’m thinking of Narnia, The Little Prince, The Velveteen Rabbit.. we are velveteen people drawn wound by wound to our Real-izer; we are the little flower who says it’s special, knows it isn’t, and hopes (until it knows) that it is Loved unto death!; and as the world spins slowly down to die, we are those who look to the terrifyingly victorious, unquenchable Aslan.

Yes, and another divine paradox is that even a mute donkey’s low bow is invited to nudge others closer to the King Whom they seek, Who awaits them– that He may call them Friends!

Comment by kathryntherese

May 1, 2007 @ 2:18 pm

We’re singing with you, Carol. Keep singing.

He has indeed descended to “transform, redeem, gather and raise up royal children of God in Him.”

I cannot add one more exclamation point to what you have said. You’ve lifted our hearts to Him here.