Longing for God Only love radiates the light of God, for His light is love. The light of Jesus Christ is love that suffers for all and with all, love in pain and sorrow, love that enters into the brokenness of humanity and receives her brokenness into Himself to heal and restore her in God. Love receives her wounds and bears them upon His body to heal her with the balm of His tenderness in mercy. The light of the world is Love, the Word Incarnate. Community, Love Crucified. Teaching Manual Love Crucified 2020 (p. 4). Kindle Edition. I find myself praying for a deeper longing for God. I sometimes get tired of my rock-like heart. I do not understand why the door seems closed…. yet I also understand it is from my side that the door is shut. It is not something that I want, but it is based on some sort of wound that is trying to save me from more suffering. Yet all healing incorporates suffering. As I age and my death seems closer than ever this longing is growing but I still remain cold more often than not. On the other hand, my thirst for prayer deepens as well as my understanding that I also fight it. It comes from a deep place this inner struggle, so I must wait, pray, and not lose hope. Jesus carries my pain, He embraces me and will not let me go, yet I am in this place of ‘hardness’, and at the same time a feeling that my heart is melting. It comes out in my Lectio. I will read a phrase, and I am filled with this deep inner longing for ‘home’, a place that if I experienced it fully would destroy my heart. So, I am not ready. No one is alone on their journey; we all share the common path of inner fragmentation, failure, longing, and seeking. It is easy to seek in the wrong place. I have done it many times, and still fail. It is the fear of pain that keeps me back from fully abandoning myself into the arms of our loving God, yet I am pursued. The lover of my soul will not let go of me. I do not understand but embrace this truth. Trust is not an easy path, since in to trust I have to face my own lack of self-love, which blocks trust. It is when the struggle is strong that I gain the inner freedom to truly trust, no matter the inner pain of my soul. We are all carried, brought into the very heart of God. Catholics call this the ‘The Sacred Heart of Jesus’. It is a reality, for in all our suffering, God suffers with us, that is the price of love. Ask any loving parent, or friend, or brother or sister.-Br.MD
A soul and God reminds me of two magnets that are drawn to each other. The closer they get the bigger the draw. The Lord told me one time in prayer, 'I will such you up , in the end, like a Humming Bird sucks up a little drop of Honey'. One French writer wrote, 'The only failure in life is not to have been a saint'. So true. This intense longing for God is a great Sign that we walk the right path. Psalms 42:1-6 1 As a deer longs for flowing streams, so my soul longs for you, O God. 2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and behold the face of God? 3 My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me continually, "Where is your God?" 4 These things I remember, as I pour out my soul: how I went with the throng, and led them in procession to the house of God, with glad shouts and songs of thanksgiving, a multitude keeping festival. 5 Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my help 6 and my God. My soul is cast down within me; therefore I remember you from the land of Jordan and of Hermon, from Mount Mizar. One lesson I have learnt and relearnt over and over again in the Spiritual Life is that emotions, how we feel are very passing things like the weather. The rock on which we stand , spiritually, is in how much we love. As St John of the Cross famously wrote. Everything else is simply passing. Standing on these sure rocks of love we can say with St Teresa: “Let nothing disturb you, Let nothing frighten you, All things are passing away: God never changes. Patience obtains all things. Whoever has God lacks nothing; God alone suffices.” ― Santa Teresa de Jesús It is a very strange thing I have noticed with very holy or saintly people I have met is that very often they seem to be the last person you would expect to be religious. Conventional piety seems in them often seems to have vanished and they seem to be the very opposite of religious. Also they seem to be very,very authentic human beings , totally themselves no pretense. This reminds me of the reaction of the people of Nazareth regarding Jesus. When He announced Himself in the Synagogue they wanted to kill Him. How could this be? Didn't they understand having lived alongside them so long how holy this family were? John 6:42 They said, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I came down from heaven’?” and: “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” John 1:46 It is in the very nature of love to be humble and very hidden. We saw this so well in the life of St Therese of the Child Jesus when after her death her fellow nuns wondered what they could write of her. So as it is for others so it can be for ourselves. We can feel ourselves a billion, billion miles from God but still long for Him. But it is not in these feelings, one way or another we should judge ourselves or that others may judge us. True Judgement is only based on love, on how much we love and at the End of the Day God and God alone will Judge this. Acts 17:31 For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.” Philippians 2:12 Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, I asked a Holy old priest in Confession a question that had been troubling me for some time a while back. I asked him how could I be sure that I was not living a Great Lie? How could I know that I was not a victim of a terrible Spiritual Deception and that my whole life had been the most terrible lie as a result of pride? That instead of being on the pilgrim path to God self deceit had placed me firmly on the Path to hell? He gave me really the most beautiful, simple answer which relived all my fears at once. He told me to ask myself if I kept all that Our Holy Mother the Church asked of me. Did I go to Mass frequently? Did I attend the Sacraments? Did I keep the Ten Commandments? Did I pray? Did I believe the Creed? Did I reject Satan and all his works? So simple an answer. What a joy to answer , 'yes', to all. If we let Our Holy Mother the Church cradle us in our arms like very little children she will carry us all home to heaven.
