46 — FREE IMMOLATION OF LIBERTY

Presence of God. — O Jesus, divine Lamb voluntarily immolated for the glory of the Father, make me understand the great value of voluntary immolation.

Meditation

1 — The vow of obedience has been optimally defined as “the free immolation of liberty” (Pius XII, Congr. Relig. Dec. 1950). This definition brings into evidence the concept of free immolation, and this, far more than a supine passivity, makes one think of an intense and noble activity which consists in the voluntary renunciation of one’s own will, in order to submit voluntarily to the will of God, expressed in the commands of superiors. We are, therefore, far from the concept of a mechanical, material obedience, or again forced, necessarily endured, by which man acts like a machine or like a servant who submits to the master only because he cannot do otherwise. Here there is only the name and the external appearance of obedience, but in reality it lacks the interior content, the formal act, which consists precisely in the free and therefore conscious renunciation of one’s own will, in order to adhere to the will of God manifested by the commands of the superior. Only by force of this twofold element: free renunciation of self and free adherence to the divine will, is obedience a perfect holocaust, so pleasing and precious in the eyes of God, as to be worth “much more than victims” (I Kings, 15, 22). If this interior element is lacking, the external act of obedience may be sufficient not to fail in the vow or promise made, but it loses its profound value and will never be a means to detach man from his will and launch him into the will of God.

When you content yourself with a material, forced obedience, as if externally you conform to the order received, interiorly however you reserve your will; you cannot therefore say that you have realized the immolation of liberty nor even that you have freely embraced the divine will. A similar obedience is a contradiction for a soul that aspires to union with God, it is a pretending to arrive at the end without using the means, it is changing the precious coin of true obedience with a vile tin coin. St. Teresa of Jesus teaches: “obedience is the shortest way and the most effective means to arrive at the most happy state of union with God” (Fd. 5, 11); it is solely, however, of that obedience which is “free immolation of liberty”, in order to will no other liberty than that of doing the will of God.

2 — A “free immolation” always demands consciousness, awareness on the part of whoever makes it, so must it be with the act of obedience. If you have made the vow or promise of obedience you must seek to keep always awake in you the sense of responsibility for the engagement taken.

Pronouncing your profession you intended to offer your will as a holocaust to the Lord, to let yourself be guided by whoever represents him; therefore, faced with the various commands of obedience — and especially faced with those that most contrast with your views or that for any motive are more grievous to you — you must be vigilant lest it happen that you take back, in practice, what you have offered by vow, which would be to commit a robbery in the holocaust. Your will you have already consecrated, sacrificed on the altar of the Lord, it is no longer yours, therefore you are no longer free to take it back. You must instead use your liberty to live, to carry out day by day your offering, that is to renew continually, faced with every disposition of obedience, the immolation of your liberty. Blessed obedience that permits you to realize your holocaust! “If you did not thus consecrate your will to the Lord — Teresa of Jesus wrote to her daughters — you would be like one who shows another a precious pearl, offers it to him, begs him to accept it, and when this other stretches out his hand to take it, withdraws the offering and hides it away very well” (Cam. 32, 7). This unfortunately is always possible even to you; indeed, even though you have sacrificed your will by vow, this remains still in your hands and it depends on your very will to keep faith with the vow made. It is therefore necessary that you be well decided to overcome your repugnances to embrace the will of God expressed in the commands of superiors.

“Obedience is the weight of the strong” (Pius XII, to Disc. Carm. Sept. 1952), precisely because it requires the strength to renounce self; but this weight, that is this renunciation, is sweet to the soul enamored of the will of God, who precisely in his love will always find the strength to deny self.

Colloquy

O Lord, what ideal more great and more beautiful than to arrive at conforming totally my will to yours, so that no longer mine, but only your will may regulate, guide, govern me in all my movements, in all my actions?

Oh, how sublime is the state of perfect conformity to your divine will! And You once more repeat to me that “to acquire this treasure there is no better means than to dig in the mine of obedience and extract it by force. The more I dig the more I shall find; the more I subject myself to men for love of you, willing no other will than that of superiors, and the more I make myself master of mine to conform it to yours. This is the true union with you, my God, this is the union that I desire, not already those suspensions very delightful to which is given the name of union, and which union is not, if not when they are preceded by this. You make me understand well, that, if I have little obedience and much will of my own, the union will not be with your will, but with my self-love. May it please you, O Lord, that I put into practice what you give me grace to understand” (cf. T.G. Fd. 5, 13).

O Lord, You know it well, to my will it does not please to submit, it does not please to renounce itself to subject itself to the will of others; there is in me a strong love of liberty, of independence, which inclines me to seek a thousand pretexts, a thousand ways to escape the necessity of depending. But you also know that no thing in the world do I love, seek, desire as the will of yours. And to live in your will, to have the certainty and the joy of acting in every thing according to your divine will I am ready, with your help, to make any sacrifice, to immolate to the very end my liberty. O Lord, increase my love for your holy will, enkindle in me the passion of your will and then will grow in me the love of obedience, golden channel through which reaches me the most precious treasure of your will.