Preface
Mental prayer is an indispensable means of interior life; indeed, normally it is its spontaneous breath. However, this is not usually achieved unless the soul applies itself to it for a certain time with its own effort: in other words, one must learn how to make prayer.
To teach souls this pious practice, methods of meditation have been devised.
There are several — and all have their merits — among them the Teresian method. It is so called because it sprang from the teachings of St. Teresa of Jesus, Foundress of the Discalced Carmelites and great mistress of the spiritual life.
We expounded this method ten years ago in a little book: the “Small catechism of the life of prayer” which has been translated into the principal European languages and also into some Asian ones. It is nothing other than an exposition of the Teresian method, derived from the works of the numerous Carmelite writers who have treated of the matter; and its wide diffusion clearly attests that this method responds to the needs and desires of many.
Therefore we believed it opportune to take a step further by offering souls of interior life a collection of subjects for meditation for every day of the year, in harmony with the Teresian conception of mental prayer and the corresponding method.
The notion of mental prayer left to us by St. Teresa is now well known. In her Autobiography she wrote that it is “nothing else than an intimate sharing of friendship; it means taking time frequently to be alone with Him who we know loves us” (8, 5). St. Teresa thus brings to light the nature, the affective tone of mental prayer: it is an “intimate sharing of friendship,” that is, an exchange of “mutual benevolence” between the soul and God, in which one “speaks intimately” with God — and intimacy is the fruit of love — and one speaks with Him of whose love one is aware. Each element of the definition contains the idea of love; but in the end the Saint reminds us that the soul must also “know,” become aware of the existence of God’s love for it. This, according to St. Teresa, is the office of the intelligence in prayer.
Thus, even according to St. Teresa, in mental prayer there is the exercise of the intelligence and that of the will: the intelligence seeks to realize that God loves His creature and wishes to be loved by it; the will, responding to the divine invitation, loves. That is all. The conception could not be clearer.
How to translate this into practice? This is the task of the method.
To understand well the structure of the Teresian method, one must keep in mind the above-mentioned definition of prayer: then one sees that, by means of this method, prayer is fully realized. In short, it is a matter of speaking affectionately with the Lord after having understood that He loves us.
Having to speak intimately with God, one must remain in contact with Him, and the “preparation” will serve for this, consisting in placing oneself more formally in the presence of God, orienting oneself toward Him with a good thought.
To convince herself of God’s love for her, the soul chooses as the theme of reflection a truth of faith suited to manifest this love; therefore she applies herself to the reading of an appropriate passage.
But reading is not enough; one must go deeper, and one goes deeper by reflection, that is, by meditation.
All revealed truths can manifest God’s love for me, but today I seek to understand it by reflecting on the theme I have chosen in the reading. I help myself with the beautiful thoughts contained in the “point” of the meditation to persuade myself of it actually, so that words of affection come spontaneously to my heart, and perhaps even to my lips.
And thus I begin my colloquy with God, in which I tell Him in every way (using what comes most spontaneously to me) that I love Him, that I want to love Him, that I want to advance in His holy love, that I want to prove my love by works, by doing His holy will.
And here we have arrived at the center, at the heart of prayer.
For many souls this is enough.
There are, however, those who desire greater variety. It is this, which for some greatly facilitates the prolongation of the colloquy with God, that is offered by three other parts of the method which, however, are optional:
The thanksgiving, by which, after having repeated to the Lord that we love Him, we express our gratitude for all the benefits received from Him and show ourselves grateful.
The offering, by which, convinced of having received so much, we seek to repay as much as possible by presenting to the Lord some good resolution. Something else that, in concluding prayer, is always useful to do.
The petition, by which, convinced of our poverty and frailty, we implore God’s help.
And here is the entire Teresian method composed of 7 parts: Two introductory: the preparation (presence of God) and the reading.
Two substantial: meditation and the colloquy.
Three optional, to prolong the colloquy more easily: thanksgiving, the offering and the petition.
The meditations published here are in harmony with this method.
We begin with the presence of God, that is, with a good thought that puts the soul in contact with God and orients it toward Him.
The reading is done by reading the “point” of the meditation. And, since many persons of interior life apply themselves to meditation twice a day, each meditation offers two points.
Then the soul sets itself to reflect, freely helping itself with the text already read.
Spontaneously it will thus pass to the colloquy which, according to the Teresian concept, is the “heart,” the center of mental prayer.
Therefore especially here our meditations wish to come to the aid of souls. For this purpose we wished to give the “colloquies” a fairly ample form — nevertheless the soul will use them very freely, choosing what corresponds to its present need — and, to render them more effective, we have composed them using the ardent and inflamed expressions of holy and fervent souls. However, very often it has been necessary to report these texts with some slight modification precisely to adapt them better to the form of face-to-face colloquy; always, however, in parentheses, the source is indicated. (Note: notwithstanding the modifications introduced, so as not to burden the citations, we do not add the usual cf.; we use this abbreviation only in cases where the colloquies, rather than being drawn from the texts of the saints, are simply inspired by them.)
In these colloquies there are not only expressions of love, but these alternate with petitions, thanksgivings, etc., and also with outbursts of the soul toward God, which take concrete form in resolutions.
We hope that, thus composed, these meditations will effectively help souls to apply themselves to mental prayer according to the Teresian concept and method.
Teresian spirituality is the spirituality of divine intimacy (cf. La spiritualità carmelitana, Rome, Collegio S. Teresa, 1943), that is, it seeks to nourish in souls the ideal of intimacy with God and to guide them toward its realization. This end is attained in a particular way by means of mental prayer which, therefore, must be in harmony with this great and lofty aspiration.
And this is precisely the “tone” that we have sought to give to our meditations, which are published under the title “Divine Intimacy” precisely to indicate that their purpose is to help souls as much as possible to attain this great goal.
Moreover, Teresian spirituality is also doctrinal. Teresa of Jesus, the great “mistress of the spiritual life,” has always desired and procured that the ascetical and mystical life of the souls dear to her be founded on solid doctrine; therefore the Saint loved theology very much. This is why we desired to trace these meditations on a seriously theological background. Indeed, we have sought to arrange them so that, in the course of a year, the fundamental problems of the spiritual life are reviewed, all the supernatural realities with which the interior life brings us into contact.
Beginning the series of meditations with the beginning of the liturgical year, this is how the material is arranged:
December - The ideal: holiness, intimacy with God, the apostolate.
January - Jesus: His Person, His Work, our relations with Him.
February and March - Interior purification and the exercise of self-denial. The Passion of Jesus.
April - The life of prayer.
May - Our Lady. The Holy Spirit.
June - Jesus in the Eucharist. The Sacred Heart of Jesus. The Most Holy Trinity.
July - The divine perfections. The theological virtues.
August and September - The moral virtues. The gifts of the Holy Spirit. The beatitudes.
October and November - The apostolate. Union with God. (As noted in the “Presentation,” at the request of many — to facilitate use of the Work — the division into months has been abolished, leaving only the order of the liturgical weeks.)
A final point we wish to note.
Precisely because Teresian spirituality is that of divine intimacy, the spirit that must pervade the exercises destined to attain it is the spirit of love. Also of this — particular nuance of the spirit of Carmel — we wished to take account. Not all collections of meditations are suitable for souls thirsting for divine intimacy, precisely because they are too permeated by the spirit of fear. Not that fear is not profitable for certain souls: but, since there are already so many books of this genre, we have believed useful a collection of meditations in which, alongside love, one finds rather the filial and reverential fear than that of the punishment due to sin, without denying that this too can be very salutary. And this is also the reason why we have dwelt by preference on the positive arguments of the virtues and of progress rather than on the negative ones of vices and sins.
The Holy Spirit, who is the Spirit of Love and deigns to dwell in our souls to take them more and more under His influence and government, may, “with most copious outpouring” of grace, enkindle in us the love of charity with which we may penetrate into divine intimacy. And the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of fair love, whose soul full of grace was always moved by the Holy Spirit, may obtain for us from this divine Spirit that we too, docile to His invitations, with the help of an assiduous and effective practice of mental prayer, may realize the beautiful ideal of intimate union with God.
Fr. Gabriele of St. Mary Magdalene, O.C.D.
Rome, feast of the Sacred Heart 1952.
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