53 — TRANSFORMING LOVE

Presence of God. — My God, may Your love invade and penetrate me until it transforms me totally in You.

Meditation

1 — As the flamelet of a candle joined to the flame of an immense fire becomes one thing with that, burning and shining unitedly to it so that it is impossible to distinguish it from the great fire in which it is immersed, similarly the soul united to God by love is lost in Him, remaining in Him so wrapped and transformed as to seem God Himself, to become “divine and God by participation, as much as is possible in this life” (G.C.C. 22, 4). God is always God, essentially distinct from the soul, however love has so united and almost conglutinated the creature to the Creator that “they are two natures in one spirit and love” (ibid.). The perfection of charity and of grace makes it that the Holy Spirit inhabits with singular fullness in the soul and in this divine Spirit — Spirit and bond of love — the soul remains totally united to the Most Holy Trinity. Here is accomplished in the most perfect way the lively desire and the ardent prayer of Jesus: “As Thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee; that they also may be one in Us” (Jn. 17, 21).

Being so united to God, the soul remains transformed in Him by love or, rather, it is love that, uniting it completely to God, renders it so conform to Him as to transform it all in Him. This transformation extends to all the powers: “the human intellect united to the divine, becomes divine” and all illustrated by the supernatural light, “the will becomes divine,” made one thing with that of God and all enflamed by holy love, and “the same be said of the memory, as also of the affections and of the appetites, all divinely transformed according to God” (G.C.N. II, 13, 11). And not only does the soul remain divinized in its being and in its powers, but also in its actions, because “God Himself is He who divinely moves and directs [its powers] according to His spirit and His will, as the operations... that the soul accomplishes... are divine operations” (G.C.S. III, 2, 8). The fullness of supernatural life, communicated to the soul in the state of spiritual marriage, realizes in it in the maximum degree the prerogative of grace which is precisely that of rendering man “partaker of the divine nature” (II Pt. 1, 4). Thus it comes to pass that we see once more the marvelous continuity that exists between the development of grace in our soul and these high states that are the last consequence and the splendid crown of it. Why, then, do we tarry in the miserable things of earth, when God has created us for these divine greatnesses?

2 — “The lover — says St. John of the Cross — cannot be satisfied if he does not feel that he loves as much as he is loved” (C.A. 37, 2). He who loves truly cannot bear to be surpassed in love, and more he feels himself loved, more he wishes to love in return. But how will the creature so weak and limited be able to equal God in love, that is, to love Him in return as much as by Him it is loved? Well, this holy and ardent pretension is realized precisely in the state of total transformation. Being the will totally transformed in that of God, “there is equality of love — affirms the Saint — because the will of the soul, converted into the will of God,... has become will of God. And thus the soul loves God with the will of God which is also its will and thus it will love Him as much as it is loved by God, since it loves Him with the will of God Himself and with the same love with which He loves it, that is the Holy Spirit” (ibid.). The Holy Spirit, third Person of the Most Holy Trinity, term and bond sustaining of the uncreated love that indissolubly unites the Father and the Son, has been given to us that, enkindling in our soul the flame of divine love, He may render us capable to love God, not already alone with our poor forces so limited, but unitedly to Him, force and infinite love. The flame of charity, enkindled in us by the divine Paraclete on the day of our baptism and from then on flamed up in proportion of our correspondence to grace, immerses itself and is lost totally in the infinite flame of the Holy Spirit, when the soul, being arrived at the total transformation in God, has become one spirit with Him. Then the soul truly loves God as it is by Him loved, because it loves Him together with the Holy Spirit. The capacity of love of the soul becomes thus, in a certain sense and by participation, almost infinite and only in such a way its love remains appeased because it can love God in return with parity of love. The soul — explains still the Mystical Doctor — “loves God together with the Holy Spirit... united to Him, by reason of the transformation... supplying [He] that which is lacking in it, for having it transformed itself in love with Him” (ibid.).

What joy and what comfort for the soul that suffers by reason of the extreme poverty of its love in comparison to the infinite love of God and to His infinite amiability, to know that the Holy Spirit can and wishes to supply for its poorness, provided it let itself be totally taken and absorbed in the immense flame of His love!

Colloquy

“O my soul, created for these greatnesses and to them called! what do you do? in what do you detain yourself? Your pretensions are basenesses and your possessions miseries. Oh, tears and deaf to so great voices, since you are blind to so great light not perceiving that, while you seek greatnesses and glory, you remain miserable and vile, ignorant and unworthy of so many goods!” (G.C.C. 39, 7).

“O Holy Spirit, You make mediation between the soul and God. You, in fact, move the soul with ardent desires and make that it be enkindled of that sovereign fire to which it is so near.

“What mercies do You use with the soul, O Lord! Be always praised and blessed for the great love that You bear us. My God and my Creator, is it possible that there be someone who does not love You? Oh, me unhappy that for so much time I have not loved You!

“How good You are, my Lord! Be forever blessed, and all creatures praise You! You have loved us so much, O my God, that we can in all truth speak of these communications that You deign to have with the souls even from this exile. Oh, infinite liberality of my God, how great are Your works! They fill with admiration him who for better to understand the truth has detached himself from everything. Yet, graces so great You grant to souls that have so offended You!... Oh, I understand nothing! When I think of it I can no longer go forward. But where could I go, besides, if not turn backward? I know not how to thank You, O Lord, for having so favored me...” (T.G.P. 5, 5; Vi. 18, 3).