Yesterday in adoration, Jesus showed me his love in a new way, a way I had never thought of or experienced.  Praying before the Blessed Sacrament, beside me was the statue of the Divino Nino. I have never had any kind of special devotion to the Child Jesus, so I really didn't pay any attention to it at all.

But while I was praying,  I felt His love as the happy, unconditional, joyful, innocent, trusting, uncomplicated love of a child with someone he loves.  Warm, beautiful, pure, simple, radiant and all embracing - like the arms of one of my little boys around my neck.  

It made me realize....This is how the Son loves His Father. This is the love He wants me to share with him.  This is the love he invites me into. The love he gives to me as well. This is how he prays to the Father.

This is how he wants me to love the Father as well...

Sitting with my Beloved I asked him to show me how to pray. 
He held my gaze and gently said 'Our Father in Heaven...'

An invitation.
A request for permission to go to a  deeper place,
a silent question, 'Do you trust me?'

A promise of love, that he leads me by the hand.
He won't leave me.

Perfect love casts out all fear. I am not afraid.

"Father, they are your gift to me..." John17:24.... "Father, Kerrie is your gift to me..."

All I know of the Father is in this and it changes everything.

He loved me into existence as a gift to the Word himself, and loved me enough to give me his beloved Son as my Redeemer and one true love.

I am created in the Love of the Father as a gift for the Son. 

He has given me to His Son, the fulfillment of my heart, in his love for me, and esteems me with so much love that he sees me a Worthy gift to His only Son.

In the eyes of almighty God, the Father, who loves His Divine Son infinitely, I am a worthy gift for him, a gift worth him humbling himself to become Man and to die for.

God the Father allowed his Son to die so that he could give me to Jesus as a gift.

What is this love? Who are you Father?

Seeking God - St Teresa of Avila

Soul, you must seek yourself in Me
And in yourself seek Me.

With such skill, soul,
Love could portray you in Me
That a painter well gifted
Could never show
So finely that image.

For love you were fashioned
Deep within me
Painted so beautiful, so fair;
If, my beloved, I should lose you,
Soul, in yourself, seek Me.

Well I know that you will discover
Yourself portrayed in My heart
So lifelike drawn
It will be a delight to behold
Yourself so painted.

And should by chance you do not know
Where to find Me
In yourself, seek Me.

Soul, since you are My room,
My house and dwelling,
 If at any time
Through your distracted ways
I find the door tightly closed,

Outside yourself seek Me not,
To find Me it will be
Enough only to call Me,
Then quickly will I come,
And in yourself seek Me.

Abide in God in the secret place
of thy soul as tranquilly as though
there had already risen upon thee
the dawn of Eternity, the unending
Day of God.

-St Albert the Great

Night feels dawn's soft approach
In early light
Emptiness is revealed as silence
Silence of absence
and
Silence of presence
of stillness,
Desire and Promise touch.

Unpronounced words of the Word
Waiting chalice beneath the pierced heart of the crucified
Light of sunrise promising the Son
Crescendo of desire and trust.

Lifted, In arms of pure light
Wordless voice
Silently speaking all
In stillness taking me away
Into Love Himself

Silence of Breath
Beneath wings that stretch and lift unburdened
To places unknown in a new flight
To the Sun
To love

Silence that embraces
Silent Love
Beautiful Silence
Veiled face of beauty Himself
Gentle burn
Constant desire and complete embrace in a timeless moment.

Osculetur me osculo oris sui.
-Song 1:1

Spiritual Lines

Spiritual lines in my interior life, pathways from God's heart to mine, and from mine to his.

LOVE

1.       Jer 1:5 Before I formed you in the womb I knew  you, 31:3-4 I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness. I will build you up again and you, Virgin Israel, will be rebuilt.  Isaiah 43:4 You are precious and honored in my sight, and I love you.

 

2.       Hosea’s wife…Hosea 2:16-22

 

3.       The Spiritual Canticle: the hiding and drawing of the Lord to his bride. The sharing of a nuptial love.

 

4.       1 John 4:18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear

 

5.       Wounds as doorways to God’s heart, to my heart. Wounds as points of union with the Wounded heart of Christ. Wounds as windows that let in light. Christ’s wounds as His vulnerability that gave love perfectly. Wounds as an exchange of self. My wounds meet his wounds in a fusion and become a path, and his blood flows into my heart and mine into his. For my wounded heart to touch His wounded heart, I must allow the thorns to press into me as well, with trust, knowing the deeper the thorns the closer is his heart to mine. An invitation to ‘compassion’ to suffer with him. To console him.

 

6.       Offering myself as a victim to Merciful Love- to Divine Mercy ( from prayer of St Therese) “I OFFER MYSELF AS A VICTIM OF HOLOCAUST TO YOUR MERCIFUL LOVE, asking You to consume me incessantly, allowing the waves of infinite tenderness shut up within You to overflow into my soul” and to give you a moment of consolation, an offering of my weakness, my complete need for your mercy, to perhaps give you a moment of respite from the flames of love that burn unreceived in your heart.

 

7.       John 17:1-26 Praying this with my name in the place of ‘they and them’. Very deeply intimate prayer of Christ for me.

 

8.       Myself as a Chalice…Mt 13:44 I am the field that God hid a treasure in, and in his joy, sold all he had and purchased with his life. A Chalice begins as flecks of unseen gold scattered in dirt. A field only sees itself as dirt, sees its value as what is on the surface. But it is torn up,  dug up, and the dirt is cleaned off, chiseled away, until the fragments of Gold remain exposing the true identity, the true worth of that field that seemed to be only dirt. The gold is purified and melted in fire. It changes. It is poured out, heated to liquid,  into the mold of a new being- the rough shape of a chalice. Then, Hollowed out, carved, emptied- empty with a purpose- empty while being made to receive. Hammered into shape, polished abrasively until a reflection can be seen in it of the one who holds it.  Created to hold the blood of God- to be filled with Him, to give him. An emptiness meant to hold nothing else but God, a sacred space where nothing else can be, a thirst for what it is created to receive. My heart as a place of sacrifice and transformation. Purified to be able to receive his own blood.  Receiving the blood of Christ, Christ himself, to give Him to others. As a chalice I am filled by Him in the Eucharist and he mine and I his- He fills and gives me to others, and in giving me allows me to give Him.

 

9.       Alabaster jars: Luke 7:36-50  Alabaster is beautiful… I think of the windows in the DG, and the Basilica of St Paul outside the Walls…but it’s true value is in what it releases…in the windows that is light, in the gospel it is perfume, in the alabaster jars in my heart it is love, faith, detachment, self-offering, trust, faith, simplicity. The gospel of the woman who broke the alabaster jar and poured it out on Christ’s feet, washed them with her tears and dried them. What alabaster jars do I have left to break and anoint him with? What tears left to cry? What love left to show?

 

TRUST

 

1.        1 Cor 2:9 What no eye has seen what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived are the things God has prepared for those who love him and Isaiah 55:8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord

 

2.       The desert….but am I Moses or Joshua?

 

3.       The ocean: in 2 ways: 1. As a shell tossed in the waves on the shore and carried back out into the deep, then again against the rocks and washed back, over and over, surrounded by the ocean, polished and smoothed.  The ocean, as Christ’s heart and as a journey deeper into him, from the fun on the sand to the warm shallows to gaining strength in the waves, to going deeper floating into the calm deep, to storms that give me nowhere else to go but to the unknown deep below the surface

 

4.       John 20:11-17 Mary Magdalene in agony, empty, alone, not understanding the empty tomb. Alone, in pain, but faithful to seeking him, continuing to be with him, Looking for the Jesus she had known, looking for a dead man, not seeing how he wanted to reveal himself in a new, unknown way, until he called her name. Luke 24:13-35 similarly, disciples, empty, lost, ‘seeking the King of Israel’ didn’t recognize him in the new way he revealed himself until he gave them the Eucharist. The risen Christ reveals himself in a new way. The cross, and the cross in me, is his place of transformation…do I look in the emptiness and seek God as he had shown me himself, or will I sit in the silence and allow Him to reveal his Risen self when he decides to.

 

HIS VOICE

 

1.       Via Pulchritudinis- beauty in art, in words, in music, in nature, in people ( especially the saints) as a path from His heart to mine

 

2.       Phil4:8 Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things – ever since university this has resonated deeply with me and inspired me

 

 

 

 

Another alabaster jar....The alabaster jar of my desire for God according to my own ideas, to how I had known him before. Of thirsting for an end to my thirst instead of thirsting purely for Him alone. The alabaster jar touched with selfishness in pursuing him, seeking rest in him and not finding, like Mary at the tomb...looking for something other than how he wants to show himself- needing to see Him to ease my pain instead of to wait, discover and embrace Him as he wants to be to me now.

I break this jar and pour out my trust and my love and my need to him. The perfume of peace fills my soul, the room we are in.  I cry tears of love and gratitude and kiss his feet. I breathe in the strong perfume of peace mixed with His own breath until my sense are intoxicated.  I wipe away the tears from his feet softly, with what I had once used to cover myself.

I have nothing and let go of my grip on desire, falling into trust instead. I can no more draw God to me that I can purify myself. I let shatter the alabaster jar of the pursuit of self which named itself the pursuit of God, the pursuit of God I know, at the feet of He who Is, who will show himself to me as he desires.

He draws me by his ways...not mine...By a path I do not know, in ways I don't understand. In secret he draws me and gives himself to me as he desires. And my desire now, is for His desires.

I am Mary at the tomb, empty, weak, exhausted, heartbroken, but persevering through the cross and the night in seeking. But seeking Christ as he was to me, instead of recognizing him as he chooses to be to me now- resurrected, transformed, new, hidden, intimate. He softly calls my name and I find him - more hidden, but more beautiful than how I had known him.  He has not taken away the better part after all.

It makes me happy to see God happy in others. Working in others, loving them, loving in them, transforming them. It makes me happy, even when I can't see him in myself.

My Jesus
There is a peace in your hiddenness
Because having nothing
And nothing having my heart
Is dark
But assures me that you want me for yourself alone.

And that only my whole heart
Is enough for you.
If I'm empty it's because I'm given to you
And it's when I seek to be full
That I lose the richness of my poverty that makes me yours.

God himself comes and banishes from his kingdom
Anything that would take His throne
Anything that would take room from him in my heart.

To be empty is to be full of His hiddenness.
To be empty is to know God is near. Is present.
Hiddenness is presence.
Emptiness fills me.

Protect what is yours, Lord
Protect the silent emptiness that is irresistible for you to fill with your hiddenness.
Protect the poverty that draws your love
Protect the weakness that draws your mercy.

But fill me with Love,
Let me Love,
Love through me.
This is proof of your presence.
In my loving others,
You love me,
We love together,
And I find you.

In forgetting myself,
True emptiness,
I love you
I serve you
I am filled with and overflow with you.
I am a vessel always empty but always full

I am a fountain over which living water flows for others to drink, and it is only in carrying this water to them that I am quenched.
Pour yourself over me, in me, through and out of me, to love me in others.

When I cease to love
I retain no love
I am dry
I can neither love nor be loved without you.

If I do not give you
I do not hold you.
I lose you.

It is when God gives me,
Pours me out,
Allows me to give Him and pour out his Love
That I am sure that I am his
And he is mine.

 

He says without words...

 

Would you know how I love you if I didn't suffer for you?

Would you value water if you didn't thirst?

You love the light more for stumbling in darkness.

Your soul knows my voice only after being deafened by silence

Your love grows when you thirst for your beloved.

The burning in your heart is a symbol of my love purifying you.

And I understand without speaking, that:

....The silence, the suffering, the thirst are all sacramental signs of a deepening, growing love

....My tears bring tears of love from Him

....My broken alabasters touch his heart deeply and move him to fill their empty place with himself

...My thirst is a sign that I am willing to love him as he loves me. Following his example.

...These things are his gifts to me, they arent my doing.

...Be passive and accept them.

...Embrace them.

 

Show me, Lord, what alabaster jars I have yet to break and pour out at your feet. What tears I have yet to cry, what love I have yet to show.

I break the alabaster jar of my heart at your feet, the self-jar I had shaped to be perfect, controlled, safe. I let my love and my tears and my thirst and my kisses run over your feet with the shattered shell on the ground, discarded.

I break the alabaster jar of my mother's heart, inlaid with tenderness, hopes, dreams and fears. I set my precious children free to be poured out by you.

It's not the alabaster jar that is beautiful, but what is inside. The love inside. The broken jar allows love to be free, to fill the air and give itself abundantly. The jar gives beauty when it is wounded, fragrance of love that it cannot give in sealed perfection.

You give me more than I can handle because my life is not my own. It is yours. You have accepted my gift of self and given yourself to live in me. It is not too much for you. I rely on your love & grace.

              

To live in the deep means

to live in

the vast unknown

bigger than I am

stronger than my strength

dark.

Silent solitude

but safely

completely

immersed in Him.

Desert

Exhausted.
I will die here.
My mind is numb, I have no air to breathe,
I am too weak.
There is nothing to quench my thirst and my hunger is ravenous.


The heat is intolerable by day and the cold by night
There is no end in sight.


I fall down and allow my grip on self, on the goal of my seeking,
to loosen out of exhaustion.
My clenched hands open in fatigue, and I give up my death grip on my security.
I give up.


In my mind I am allowing my search for Love himself to die, but I discover the hunger for him still lives.
What dies is is my fearful grip on the desires of self, control, my cherished, precious desire to feel God love me.
The need.
What dies is the need centered on myself. The consuming need to FEEL loved by Him, important, safe, not abandoned, never discarded.  The fear laying at the core that I would fight and hold on to at the same time.


And I die, but not me.
A shell of self falls off that I never knew I could be free from, a skin shed. I let go of the self that I have made and stand to discover myself as the person that God has made.
A parasite that was starving me, while I thought it was God who was killing me.


I can stand again. My thirst is different. I am lighter, I am freer.
One step in front of the other, in the heat, in the darkness
Moving now without the heavy burden of fear, and the self created as a shield I was carrying before, I have new strength to go on.


Seeking not to feed the thirst of self for love, feelings, worth, but to seek God himself who is my true thirst, my life, my everything.
The hidden God, the silent God, the present God.
The God deeper in me than those cravings and desires could sense.


Who sustains me as I seek him.
And I continue on my journey.
Deo Gratis

In the night, in the storm, walking on the water you took away my securities and held me tight.
On Tabor you took away my fears.
You are purifying me.
Taking away what keeps me from you
Emptying me to fill me with new wine.
I am happy. My soul is at peace. 
Purifying fire, you haven't forgotten or abandoned me.
The silent flame means I am never alone.
Deo Gratis

You don't just want me to serve you
 you don't just want my mind, my heart or my love.


You want all of me. All of me absorbed into all of you, all of you living in me.

I can thank you for what you take away
its clear that you are emptying me, so you must not have forgotten me... and I have comfort it knowing your hand, unfelt, unseen, is still on me.
I trust in your promise

Every moment is a sacrament. God gives himself to us under the shadow of the mundane.  See him in everything. Don't simply reject the superficial, see past it to what God sees.

Do not suffer over your suffering.

acceptance....patience...surrender

There a moments a child is inconsolable and must cry himself to exhaustion before he can be comforted, before he can feel the love of his parents. before he can rest. before he can see things with clear eyes and reason and a smile.

Seek him in faith and love, without seeking to satisfy yourself in anything, or to understand more than is expedient for you to know; for faith and love are the guides of the blind; they will lead you, by a way you know not, to the secret chamber of God.

Rest therefore neither wholly or in part on what your faculties can embrace; never seek to satisfy yourself with what you comprehend of God, but rather what you comprehend not; never rest on the love of, and delight in, that which you can understand and feel, but rather on that which is beyond your understanding and feeling: this is, as I have said, to seek him by faith.

Such a one loves no one else, so in the absence of the object beloved, nothing can console or relieve him.

the soul groans when the heart is enamoured, for where love wounds there is heard the groaning of the wounded one, complaining feelingly of the absence of the beloved, especially when, after tasting of the sweet conversation of the bridegroom, it fnds itself suddenly alone, and in aridity, because He has gone away.

Certain secret touches of love, which like a fiery arrow, pierce and penetrate the soul, and burn it with the fire of love. These are called the wounds of love.

The affections of the will lead most rapidly to the possession of the Beloved, whose touch it felt, and as rapidly also, His absence and its inability to have the fruition of HIm here as it desires.

Still the beloved withholds himself whicle the soul has lost all things, even itself, for Him; it obtains no compensation for its loss, seeing that it is deprived of HIm whom it loves.

The tabernacle lamp
The dolphin
The sparrow on the deck while I prayed

I am Herod. I am Gomer. I have sold myself and sold you. Not my body, but worse, my heart.  And what is my punishment but to taste divine love? To know the thirst of mercy for me, a love that chooses me for his bride and gives everything to be mine.

Therefore Though painfully,I  glory in my weakness, my shame that draws so powerfully the love of the God of mercy and learn to trust a love that is too good to be true, to give my whole self to one who sees all in me and loves me completely. When I give him my sin, he takes the joy of being my savior.  In my weakness he is strong. In my nothing he is all.


Hosea1:22
I will betroth you to me with fidelity,
and you shall know the LORD.

In the desert I learn how weak I am. I burn under the sun and am cold in the darkness. I thirst for you alone. I want nothing else but you, no gift, no shadow, no sign. They are mirages... I want you. Make my heart a desert too, empty, silent, peaceful where you can walk and find rest in me.

Longing for?

I had identified the longing for god that I have with the longing to sense his love. I can see now that is not what i long for, but for the love behind what i sense. I long for him, but in a way I havent experienced  and dont understand.  And at the same time, i see that very quietly, he is already giving that love to me. Already filling me with himself. While the storm came and blew away the experiences i had come to love and cling to, he was quietly working below the storm and giving me himself in a deeper way. A peace. A presence. That what I long for, who I long for, isn't gone. It is within me. And with a magnificence and substance strength that is deeper than I knew. I have had a small taste of the old wine and it changes how i see the new wine i thought i was thirsting for.