Mirror of the Soul

In honor of a certain obscure Franciscan dear to my heart whose feastday happens to fall today, my patron Blessed Jacopone da Todi (to learn the story there read the post from two years ago here and for last year's post go here), I want to share with you a few stanzas from one of his poems:

HOW THE LIFE OF JESUS IS THE MIRROR OF THE SOUL
(Lauda xxxix)

Life of Jesus Christ!
Mirror of Verity!
Mine own deformity
I see in that clear Light.

Somewhat, methought, I was;
Somewhat, methought, I seemed;
The Self of which I dreamed
I gladly did survey.
But gazing on that Glass,
The light thenceforth that streamed
On my true nature gleamed:—
Down in the depths it lay!
Needs must I weep and pray;
For, far as earth from skies,
Seeing from Being lies—
Distant as day from night.
…

O false esteem of self!
How couldst thou dare to bring,
As offerings to thy King,
These worthless works of thine?
Thy nature, all deformed,—
Ah, what an evil thing
To urge it, tottering,
Before that Light Divine!
These errors that are mine,
Must loose me from their sway;
Disorder must away,
Ere God with man unite.

...

I cannot be re-born
Till mine own self be dead;
My life out-poured, out-shed,
Sheer essence to renew: 
On glorious Nothingness
He only can be fed,
Whom God Himself hath led;—
Here man hath naught to do.
O glorious state and true!
In Nothingness to cease.
Desire and mind at peace
In calmness infinite.

May that light of Christ be mirrored in your own soul as you prepare for the celebration of His coming only a few days from now!

Maybe You Would Do It?

There's always something more you want, isn't there?

Thus the mortal coil.

There's always something we want—something we need—for ourselves or for those we love.  Sometimes we can pray desperately for that thing, whatever it is, convinced that if only God would grant us that then everything would be okay—not perfect still, but good.

That's a lie of course.  As soon as He granted that one thing there would always be something else we needed to make us happy or holy or whatever adjective reared its masked head.

I can hardly help but marvel at how universally true that seems to be.  Whether I am in the midst of trials, struggling along by force of stubborn will, and think if only I had some bit of clarity, I could bear the suffering; or whether I have had a most amazing weekend full of good connections and bits of spiritual insight and think there is this one thing that would be awesome if God would do: that something is there, impossible to forget, and as changeable as our fickle emotions.

In one such recent moment, there came to my mind a delightful analogy, which I would like to share with you.  I shall embellish it for you in dramatic form, as a playwright must, even though the imagery my mind conjured up was much better than these few paltry words woven more for comic effect than realism:

ME: I know You probably aren't going to do this thing, and I don't really need it, but it would be so amazing and I know You could do it if You wanted to.

GOD: Why would you want that? Because you want to be a puddle for the devil to come and drink up? I want you to be a warrior in armor when he comes to attack you.

ME: Well, no, I don't want the devil to drink me up like I'm a bunch of liquid, but—

GOD: That's what you're asking for.  If you're saying please give me whatever I want so all I have to do is sit here and bask in the light reflecting off me, then in essence you are saying don't give me all of these opportunities to train myself and become strong enough to carry the armor that will withstand the enemy's straw.

ME: I thought I'd have to worry about more than a straw in the enemy's attack.

GOD: Only if you have armor.

ME: Then what will he come against me with?  A toothpick?

GOD: Probably more like a vacuum cleaner.

ME: So my armor has to be heavy enough that I can't be sucked up?

GOD: Now you've got the right idea.

ME: What if I had heavy armor?

GOD: You don't need to worry about that when you're still at the try-not-to-be-a-puddle stage.

Powerlessness

So many times we question God.  Either we want to know why He allowed something to happen or why He did not do something in response to our prayers.

We ask why because we feel helpless.  We feel powerless.

Of course we do not like this feeling, so we try to gain control in any way we can, scrambling in search of something that will give us security.  We build up facades, collect things and friends, and so on, all to counter that loss of control.

Still, in the end, we cannot seize control, but only a deceptive shadow of it.  Only God has the power to rule the universe.

Ultimately our condition is one of powerlessness.  We may experience it when we feel our own lives spinning out of control.  Or we may see a friend struggling and desire to lift him up out of that darkness, to win by our own prayers his release.  Yet God does not grant light.  He allows us and our friends to suffer.

For both of us, that is an experience of complete helplessness.  It may even be the proverbial rock bottom.

God brings us there that He may win our surrender.  It is often only when we cannot trust even ourselves that we learn to trust Him.  If we have nowhere else to turn, we will go to Him.  So He remains silent until we are brought to His feet and know that He alone is King.

Green-Eyed Monster

Iago: O, beware, my lord, of jealousy;
It is the green-ey'd monster, which doth mock
The meat it feeds on. That cuckold lives in bliss,
Who, certain of his fate, loves not his wronger:
But O, what damnèd minutes tells he o'er
Who dotes, yet doubts, suspects, yet strongly loves!

Othello: O misery!

~

Shakespeare was a brilliant man.  One need only feel the tearing effect of jealousy to know at once how truthfully his characters speak and how perfectly they enact the results of jealousy.

Throughout my life, I have found myself wanting to do everything—or at least everything that I perceive as good.  It matters little how many wonderful things I have done or how much I have accomplished, but as soon as I hear of someone else's amazing project I must be jealous.  I begin to wonder why others get to do all these spectacular things while I muddle along where I am.

Someone reminded me recently of how we all make up what is lacking in each other.  If I could do everything myself there would be no need of anyone else.  Yet because I cannot do everything—because after all I am not God—and because I am but one small part of the world's community, I must allow others to be good also.

Their goodness does not take away from mine.  Somehow jealousy twists us up inside so that we believe the opposite, but others' abilities can never lessen ours.

It is folly of course to draw our self-image from our accomplishments anyway, but of course we fallen creatures must persist in that folly.  Then we find ourselves crushed because someone else has done what we wished to do or is better at something than we are.  Yet there will always be someone we will perceive as better than we are at doing something we wish to do.  In such a populated world the statistics of that being true are incredibly likely.

However, that does not take away from our individual contribution.  No matter whether someone else may be better in a particular area, or even in all areas, we still have a part to play that no other can.  We may not know it, but the reality remains.

When we begin to know that reality with our hearts, then we can appreciate others' gifts and talents without jealousy.  That takes much humility.

Blessed John Henry Newman spoke beautifully of our personal vocations.  By reminding ourselves constantly that we are not our own, that we do not live for ourselves but for God, we shall gain greater confidence in accepting what we can and cannot do.  If I live to achieve something great for God, in the end it becomes about me and what I have done instead of what God has done.  Yet if I can truly live for Him, then naught else matters.

I will leave you with Newman's words:

God has created me to do Him some definite service. He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another. I have my mission.
I may never know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next.
I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons.

He has not created me for naught. I shall do good; I shall do His work.

I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place,
while not intending it if I do but keep His commandments.

Therefore, I will trust Him, whatever I am, I can never be thrown away.
If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him,
in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him.
If I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him.
He does nothing in vain. He knows what He is about.
He may take away my friends. He may throw me among strangers.
He may make me feel desolate, make my spirits sink, hide my future from me. Still, He knows what He is about.

Your Choice

How will you suffer?

In essence that is the question that we face each day of our lives.  We all will suffer.  It is not as if by choosing the way of individual freedom and pleasure we could ever choose not to suffer.  For suffering truly is part of the human condition.

Nor by choosing Christ will we have no more suffering.  Sometimes people think that all we need to do is follow Him and then we will never suffer again but will always be filled with joy and love for all the world.  Unfortunately that is not the case.  I have had to learn that lesson myself.  To be perfectly honest, that is a lesson I must continually re-learn.  My head of course knows the reality, but when my Lord bestows joys upon me as I seek to do His will my heart begins to expect that serving Him will be an easy and joyful thing and then I face trials and my heart wavers.

It was the priest's homily at Mass this morning that inspired my reflection today.  He spoke so simply and clearly to the heart of this matter, asking this question: will you suffer on your own or will you suffer with Christ?

In all our suffering we have the choice of suffering in union with Christ or trying to face it all on our own strength.  Suffering with Him will not take away the suffering.  It will not make it easier to bear.  Yet it will give us the strength to bear it, the reason to bear it, and the hope that through that suffering we will attain a greater good for ourselves or others.

My Will Be Done

"There is so much unbelief in the world, for too many people speak of God unworthily and never stop finding fault with His activities in a manner they would never dare use toward the most incompetent workman.  What we really want to do is restrict His work so that it conforms to the rules and boundaries that our limited reason considers suitable.  We try to improve and do nothing but complain and grumble.  Yet we are surprised at the way the Jews treated Jesus Christ!  Ah! when I think of God's love, His adorable will, His unerring acts, I cannot believe how He is treated.  How can the will of God be unreasonable?  How can it ever be wrong?  Yet we say: "There's this bit of business of mine.  I need this.  What I want has been taken from me.  My neighbor is hindering the good works I want to do.  Now, isn't this quite unreasonable?  And, on top of it all, I fall ill just when I should be fit...."

Thus the words I read this morning from Abandonment to Divine Providence, words that seem altogether fitting as I struggle with a cold that seems to have sucked away all my strength.  I have so little time at home these days that I think I ought to feel well so I can accomplish all that must be done.  Yet apparently my Lord wills otherwise.

How much I find myself falling into the trap of willing what He wills only so long as it fits within the breadth of what I wish.  I begin to float along, thinking I have abandoned myself, and then all of a sudden I come up abruptly against some great wall before me that halts me at once, preventing me from following my desired course and forcing me to follow another.  Sometimes I think He allows such things just to remind me that I must want His will because it is His will and not merely because it pleases me.

Yes, I must will as He wills, unite my will to His.  Nothing else matters.  Nothing else is important.  In the words of de Caussade:

"...Now let me tell you that the will of God is all that is necessary, and what it does not give you is of no use to you at all.  My friends, you lack nothing.  You would be very ashamed if you know what the experiences you call setbacks, upheavals, pointless disturbances, and tedious annoyances really are.  You would realize that your complaints about them are nothing more nor less than blasphemies—though that will never occur to you.  Nothing happens to you except by the will of God, and yet His beloved children curse it because they do not know it for what it is."

How true!  We do not know that His will is His love.  We are still spoiled children who think that love is giving us exactly what we want.

It came to my heart that He must love me very much to deprive me of what I so greatly desire and to allow to happen to me what I find unpleasant.  For who does not desire to give that child, no matter how spoiled, exactly what he wishes?  Even more must my Lord desire to give me that for which I ask and that for which I dare not ask.  Yet one thing restrains Him: His love for me alone.  For He loves me not only enough to suffer in my place, but He loves me enough to let me suffer.  That is surely true love.

Everything Leads to Goodbye

A while ago I had the opportunity to view a film of a theatrical production of Kiss the Moon, Kiss the Sun and one thing in particular that struck me was the phrase, "Everything leads to goodbye."  That reflected the experience of a disabled man, a major character in a quite beautiful story, but I will say no more about it so as to avoid any spoilers for those who may wish to experience the story for themselves.

Everything leads to goodbye.

That phrase has continued to echo in my mind these past months.  How much it reflects our experience of this life!

So many times people comment that they hate goodbyes.  Then they refuse to say goodbye and just say, "See you later," or some other trite phrase.  (Which in my opinion is a trifle silly, as the origin of goodbye is simply "God be with you," a beautiful wish for anyone, and implies no end, but thus the corruption of language.)

How silly we are sometimes to try to hold on so hard.  We try to preserve the past with hordes of pictures and memorabilia that we scarcely ever bother to look back at and then we complain prodigiously about the amounts of stuff we have.  We are always trying to perpetuate the goods of the current moment, just as the apostles at the Transfiguration wanted to build tents that Christ might remain there with Moses and Elijah always.  We do not want anything we perceive as good to pass away.  So we become slaves to the past.

It is not only things we hold onto, but people too.  We try to retain the relationships we had whether people die or drift out of our lives.

I used to think that everything would work out and that all the tangled web of relationships lost or strained would be straightened out if only I sought love and trusted in God.  I thought I would understand why those goodbyes had to come and why those things happened that led up to the necessity of breaking or loosening ties.

Yet as time goes on and the ache of those broken relationships goes on, I doubt I will find the happy endings I once looked for.  Perhaps I read too much as a child, for my mind seems to have been trained to believe that everything will tie up neatly and reach its wrapped-up end within a short and reasonable time.  Or perhaps that is merely human nature.

In any case, I know now that when I expect those perfect conclusions, I place all the emphasis on events resolving outside of myself.  (To put it in dramatic terms, I focus on plot instead of on character.)  In other words, I let go of my own responsibility.

Reality does not reflect my desires.  Instead of finding the warped threads of scattered paths coming together into one clear line, I am seeing the threads diverge more and more across the dark wood before me.

Yet my heart knows the Presence that remains still no matter how broken and empty it is.  The more I let go, the more I become aware of that great and awesome Presence waiting.

My heart is beginning to understand a deeper reality: it is not those ecstatic moments of joy and heart-felt connection to which we must cling.  Indeed, we must cling to nothing.  We must let go, adrift on the dark flowing waters as the moon and stars shine down upon us.  We can smile up at that night sky because our hearts are set free—because we are okay with goodbyes even if they last until forever.