33 — TOWARD A COMPLETE PURIFICATION

Presence of God. — Help me, Lord, that I may have the strength to undertake of my own initiative a complete purification.

Meditation

1 — “The soul that wishes to attain the high state of union with God encounters great obstacle when it becomes attached to some manner of its own of understanding, feeling or imagining, when it attaches itself to its own opinion or will, or to any other thing of its own, and does not know how to detach itself from all this and strip itself entirely” (A. II, 4, 4). The office of the night of the spirit is precisely that of operating in the soul this profound and radical detachment. If you wish, therefore, to enter into this night, that will bring so much good to your soul, you must seek, as much as you can, to deny yourself in everything and especially in that which concerns and is dearest to you; you must be disposed to renounce your plans, your projects, your views, not only with regard to earthly things, but also with regard to spiritual things, because you must go to God not by a way of your choice and taste, but solely by the way that He Himself has prepared for you. You must be disposed to renounce divine consolations, to walk in darkness, in aridity and for all the time that the Lord wills; you must be disposed to renounce the dearest works, the most legitimate affections, the holiest friendships, the support of whoever understands and guides you in the ways of God.

Few actually enter into the night of the spirit, precisely because “few know and wish to enter into the void and perfect nudity of the spirit” (ibid., 7, 3). Few, even among the spiritual, are persuaded that the way that leads to union with God “consists in one thing only, that is, in truly denying oneself, both in the interior and exterior, embracing with heart the suffering for Christ, annihilating oneself in everything” (ibid., 8). Seek, therefore, at least you to be persuaded of this and to regulate yourself in every thing with the greatest detachment, not stopping with affection of property or with vain complacency either at material goods or at spiritual goods. Look at Jesus on the cross: He was truly stripped and deprived of every thing, “abased and humbled in everything, that is: regarding the reputation of men, since seeing Him die on a tree, far from having a bit of esteem for Him, they made fun of Him; and as regards nature, since in it in a certain way He annihilated Himself dying; and regarding the protection and spiritual comfort of the Father, who in those moments abandoned Him” (ibid., 11). From here you must understand what is the way to unite yourself to God and you must realize that the more you annihilate yourself for love of Him, the more you unite yourself to Him.

2 — The generous practice of total renunciation is not the only thing that you can do to enter into the night of the spirit; there is another, no longer negative, but eminently positive: an intense exercise of the theological virtues. Faith, hope and charity must be your support, your guide in the obscurities of the night and, at the same time, must help you to purify the powers of your spirit: intellect, memory and will, that they may adhere to God alone.

“Faith — says St. John of the Cross — produces the void in the intellect” (A. II, 6, 2). Indeed, proposing to you to believe things that by their height you cannot comprehend, faith teaches you that, to unite yourself to God, rather than leaning on your manner of reasoning and understanding, you must instead strip yourself of it, which means placing the intellect in void. The more you progress in faith, the more you will detach yourself from your low manner of thinking, and this not only with regard to divine mysteries and your direct relations with God, but also concerning the events of life, events that you will learn to judge only in relation to God.

Hope, instead, places “the memory in darkness” (ibid., 3) emptying it of all things. If you hope strongly, it means that you await goods that you do not yet have and you are not content with those that you already possess. If you place all your hopes in God, it means that you no longer hope in the things of earth, that their possession does not satisfy you, consequently their memory becomes less vivid, less frequent and thus your memory remains empty, capable of applying itself solely to what concerns God and His service. Exercise yourself intensely in hope of celestial things and you will forget earthly things; hope in God alone and you will no longer be occupied with the memory of creatures.

“Charity, finally, empties the will of all things, because it obliges us to love God above them: which cannot happen except by turning affection away from them to place it entirely in God” (ibid., 4). If you wish to attain total detachment and renunciation, you must love much. The more you grow in divine love, the more you will detach yourself with facility from earthly things and also from yourself, the more you will be capable of denying your will and annihilating your ego in all things.

Walk in faith, in hope, in love and you will advance in the night of the spirit without losing yourself in the obscurities and darknesses that you may encounter, because these virtues will keep you strongly anchored in God.

Colloquy

“Lord, make possible to me with Your grace what to me seems impossible by nature. You know that I am worth little to suffer and I become discouraged as soon as a small difficulty arises. For the glory of Your name may any trial and tribulation become lovable and desirable to me, since to suffer and to be persecuted for love of You is of great utility.

“Jesus, my Lord, assist me in every place and circumstance; may my consolation be to deprive myself spontaneously of all earthly glories; and if divine comfort should fail me, may my supreme consolation be Your will and the just trial to which You subject me, since You will not wish to be marked with Your servant, nor threaten me in perpetuity.

“O Lord, provided that my will always remains upright and firmly united to You, do with me as best pleases You, since what You do for me cannot be other than most excellent. If You wish that I live in darkness, be blessed; if You wish me in light, be also blessed; if instead You wish that I suffer, be equally blessed forever.

“Lord, I am disposed to tolerate willingly for love of You all that it shall please You to dispose; from Your hand I wish to receive with the same spirit evil and good; I will no longer have fear of death, nor of hell. Provided that You do not distance me from You forever, no adversity that may happen to me can do me harm” (Imit. III, 19, 5; 16, 2; 17, 2 and 4).