Chapter XII: That Mental Prayer is especially indispensable for the Spouses of Christ

SOULS who have heard the voice of the Holy Spirit inviting them to a close alliance with the Son of God, stand in need of mental prayer more than all others; for the call which they have received and the life which they have vowed necessarily imply mental prayer. "Hearken, O daughter," says the psalmist, "and see, and incline thy ear: and forget thy people and thy father's house."¹ In these words we have a summary of the effects which that contact with God, only found in prayer, should work in the human soul. These effects are the enabling that soul to listen with attention, to open her eyes to the sovereign Beauty, and to incline her heart to exact and courageous fidelity in all the duties of her state of life. "And the King shall greatly desire thy beauty."² Then the King will bend down, He will take full possession of this daughter of men, to make her His own for ever by causing her to become a sharer of His throne of glory.

A soul consecrated to God is in truth like one of those maidens sprung of royal blood who, in former times, was taken beforehand into the country and family of her future spouse. What then took place, we know from the Book of Esther. What attentions were lavished! How careful was the search for everything necessary to prepare the bride; for her contemplated union! What solicitude on her part to guess the tastes of the king! And when the union is accomplished, with what exactitude does not the queen accommodate herself to all the minutest customs of that court, and to the sanctioned ceremonial, humbly waiting till the king deigns to summon her into his presence! During this period of expectation, how constantly is she preoccupied with the fear of giving displeasure, how ardently desirous is she of securing her king's favour.

Is not this a picture of the life in a monastery of virgins? All are espoused to the King of kings, but all have not yet free access to Him. They must first become initiated into the ways of the royal court, they must study the character and the tastes of their Spouse, and entirely conform to them, that they may please their Lord, and may be allowed in due time to enjoy intimacy with Him.

The dignity of sovereigns seems ordinarily to require that their marriages should be celebrated by proxy. Consider then what is and what should be the legitimate curiosity of a princess irrevocably united to a powerful prince whom she has never seen; what inquiries, what efforts does she not make to find out what he is like, what he loves, and what he wishes.

Do we not here see an outline of the part that prayer must take in the contemplative life? For if by virtue of her consecration, the religious soul is irrevocably united, though only by proxy, to the King of kings and Lord of lords; if she knows through the holy Scriptures and the teaching of the Church the nobility and the beauty of her Lord, still she has never been with Him face to face. He has sent her many messages and incomparable tokens of His love. Like Rebecca, she has received from the hands of Eleazer the earrings of faith, the bracelets of the divine commandments.³ She is enriched with His grace; already Baptism and Confirmation have bedecked her "as a bride adorned with her jewels."⁴ The demon contemplates with jealous and angry envy this bride clad in her glittering attire: "She clothed herself with the garments of her gladness, and put sandals on her feet, and took bracelets and lilies and earlets and rings, and adorned herself with all her ornaments."⁵ Yes, men and the very devils look upon souls consecrated to God as truly espoused to the divine King.

What then would men say of those who in so noble a position should scarcely ever think of their Spouse, or of His kingdom, or of His interests or of those who form His court, but should content themselves with observing in His regard the strict rules of etiquette? Seeing them so disposed, no one could help thinking that if they truly loved their King, their heart would make them more anxious to know Him better. Yet this is the picture of a soul consecrated to God and having no desire for mental prayer and meditation; she seems indifferent about her Lord, as though she were in no hurry to know Him.

The Church, the mistress of divine love, gives her, in the Advent Liturgy, a very different example; that liturgy admirably expresses the sentiments of the soul at its first entrance upon the spiritual life. There we find most careful preparation, zealous zeal to banish everything that could offend the eyes of the Lord who is coming; diligent search for all that can please Him. There again we find the purification of penance, together with all the anxiety of a loving fear which the Holy Ghost inspires. Finally, we find ardent, generous and burning desires which, by making straight God's paths, hasten the hour of the King's happy coming.

Again, meditation is, with respect to the soul, like the dialogue between Rebecca and the faithful servant who came to propose to her the nuptials with Isaac. Nothing disheartens the bride elect; neither the long waiting, nor the difficulties of the journey, nor the dangers she may encounter: “Vadam, I will go,”⁶ she says, “I will follow the Holy Spirit—the Divine Eleazer.” And she starts off at once, but before reaching the end of her journey how many conversations must she have had about that longed for goal, and about the spouse whom she was to meet there?

The day will dawn at last when she will come into the presence of Isaac, even before reaching the house of the nuptials; but she will then be veiled. All this is mysteriously symbolic of what our destinies are to be. Yes, before meeting the Bridegroom, the bride is unveiled—she speaks freely with Eleazer about the Eternal Truth; but if, already in this life, leaving behind all images and figures, she meets the Spouse Himself, she quickly takes her veil and covers herself, for though she is in presence of her Lord, her eyes cannot behold Him: “Clouds and darkness are round about him.”⁷ But better, better far is it to be with Him, though without sight, than to contemplate the most vivid images of His beauty.

It is thus that after having gone forth to meet the soul whom He has chosen, after having stooped to her, after having found in her an ardent desire for Him, a constant watchfulness for Him, the heavenly King, in His turn, fulfils in her regard all the promises contained in the Rite of the Consecration of Virgins. He raises her up to Himself and grants her, as far as may be in this life, the experience of eternal good things. Then, also, she becomes more powerful over the Heart of God; her prayer is at once more elevated and universal. Henceforth she embraces in her petitions the interests of her Spouse in all their universality; for the Holy Spirit addresses every consecrated soul in the words of Mardochai to Esther: “Think not that thou mayest save thy life only, because thou art in the king's house, more than all the Jews: for if thou wilt now hold thy peace, the Jews shall be delivered by some other occasion: and thou and thy father's house shall perish. And who knoweth whether thou art not therefore come to the kingdom, that thou mightest be ready in such a time as this?"⁸

In point of fact, in order to escape death, it is not enough to be in the king's house; the queen cannot disown her race, she must labour to save it if she desires to secure her own safety. Here lies the whole secret of a vocation higher than that of other men; if the soul thus chosen for divine espousals either shrink back or shut herself up in cold egotism, God will easily find another fulcrum, other souls more generous and faithful, to whom He will confide the carrying out of His work. Do not these threatening words point to the decline of religious Orders? The members having failed in their mission, God, as a punishment for their failure, at last deprives them of their ancient appenage, and bestows it upon more fervent souls.

But the true Esther does not fail in her duty. Prepared by fasting and prayer she goes to the King, and finds favour in His eyes. "What wilt thou, Queen Esther? What is thy request? If thou shouldst even ask one half of the kingdom, it shall be given to thee."⁹ And the most prudent princess, whose ambition is unlimited and who knows the power of love, beseeches her lord that he would deign to come and sit at her table: "If it please the king, I beseech thee to come to me this day, and

Aman with thee to the banquet which I have prepared.”¹⁰

Let us take notice that Esther invites the king to come to her, and that she does not ask to go to him: it is a figure of the present life, during which the soul aspires to possess her Lord already before her entrance into eternity. It is to a banquet that she invites Him, with the determination of inebriating Him with the wine of love and of not allowing the presence of her enemy Aman to hinder her from so doing. Thus, even here on earth, the demon has no power to hinder from true contemplation a soul generously devoted to God; all his vain efforts simply make his own condemnation the heavier. Aman's presence does not prevent the holy inebriation of the king, nor his ineffable complacency in the bride who has won his heart. Esther is not intimidated nor silenced nor impeded in her designs; nothing comes of Aman's presence but a more shameful fall and a more humiliating defeat for the enemy.

All this is what happens on earth whenever a Spouse of our Lord, faithful to her vocation and using all the means of sanctification which she has in her power, intervenes to make intercession for the salvation of souls, this being the fruit, the pledge and the reward of her union with our Lord Jesus Christ.

Footnotes

1. Audi filia, et vide, et inclina aurem tuam, et obliviscere populum tuum et domum patris tui (Ps. xliv, 11). ↩

2. Et concupiscet Rex decorem tuum (Ps. xliv, 12). ↩

3. Gen. xxiv, 47. ↩

4. Quasi sponsam ornatam monilibus suis (Isa., lxi, 10). ↩

5. Induit se vestimentis jucunditatis suæ, induitque sandalia pedibus suis, assumpsitque dextraliola, et lilia et inaures, et annulos et omnibus ornamentis suis ornavit se (Judith, x, 3). ↩

6. Gen., xxiv, 58. ↩

7. Nubes et caligo in circuitu ejus (Ps., xcvi, 2). ↩

8. Ne putes quod animam tuam tantum liberes, quia in domo regis es, præ cunctis Judæis; si enim nunc silueris, per aliam occasionem liberabuntur Judæi, et tu, et domus patris tui, peribitis. Et quis novit utrum idcirco ad regnum veneris, ut in tali tempore parareris? (Esth., iv, 13, 14). ↩

9. Quid vis, Esther regina? Quæ est petitio tua? Etiam si dimidiam partem regni petieris, dabitur tibi (Esth., v, 3). ↩

10. Si regi placet, obsecro ut venias ad me hodie, et Aman tecum, ad convivium quod paravi (Ibid, v, 4). ↩