Mental Prayer — Application of the Senses

As I walk in my garden I see with pleasure the vari-coloured flowers, I rejoice in the lights and shadows among the trees, I hear the song of birds and the hum of bees — all this culminating in something higher, more subtle than mere sense appreciation. My inner self is, on a spring day, filled with a joy of life, or on a calm summer evening with a repose, a sweetness which refreshes both soul and body. I taste, as it were, that something which is spring or evening summertide. Now all this is nothing else but an application of the senses of the imagination, and it is as rightfully employed, and with profit, in mental prayer.

First point. See Jesus crucified — loving me — dying for me. See His Five Wounds, from which flows the price of my salvation; His Sacred Heart opened to receive me, burning with Divine love, offered to the Eternal Father. See and gather in mind and heart the virtues of this Mystery — infinite love, patience, tenderness, generosity. See the compassionate Mother; learn with her a tender compassion for Jesus suffering. See Mary Magdalene, adoring. See St. John, wrapped in the Divine Mystery, uniting himself in love with his Lord. Gather fruit from this Tree of Life and from those who are beneath it.

Third point. "O taste and see" the hidden Godhead, the sweet virtues of the human soul of Jesus; the Sacred Humanity, so dear to God, to itself, to us. The Saviour's choices: poverty, suffering, contempt, thirst, dereliction, the Cross.