> [[359-humble-and-reverent-love|← 359. Humble and Reverent Love]] | [[-divine-intimacy-toc|TOC]] | [[361-unitive-love|361. Unitive Love →]] --- # 360. Strong and Active Love PRESENCE OF GOD - Lord, grant that my love for You may not be content with words, but prove itself in generous deeds. ## Meditation 1 “Love is never idle” ([[teresa-of-avila-saint|T.J.]] Int C V, 4). When true love of God enters the soul it gradually begets in it an interior dynamism so strong and forceful that it spurs it on to seek ever new ways of pleasing the Beloved, and makes it diligent in devising fresh means of proving its fidelity to Him. Love, in fact, is not nourished by sweet sentiments or fantasies, but by works. “This love,” says St. Teresa, “is also like a great fire which has always to be fed lest it should go out. Just so with these souls [in which God Himself kindles the flame of charity]; cost them what it might, they would always want to be bringing wood, so that this fire should not die” ([[tj-life-ccel-toc|Life]], 30). The soul that truly loves does not stop to examine whether a task is easy or difficult, agreeable or repugnant, but undertakes everything in order to maintain its love. It even chooses by preference tasks which demand more sacrifice, for it knows that love is never truer than when it urges the sacrifice of self for the One loved. Hence, through love, “there is caused in the soul a habitual suffering because of the Beloved, yet without weariness. For, as [[augustine-of-hippo-saint|St. Augustine]] says, ‘Love makes all things that are great, grievous, and burdensome to be almost naught.” The spirit here has so much strength that it has subjected the flesh and takes as little account of it as does the tree of one of its leaves. In no way does the soul here seek its own consolation or pleasure, either in God, or in aught else” ([[jc-dark-night-toc|J.C. DN]] IT, 19,4). This explains the attitude of the saints, who not only embraced wholeheartedly the sufferings with which God strewed their paths, but sought them with jealous care, as the miser seeks gold. St. John of the Cross replied to Our Lord, who had asked him what recompense he desired for the great services he had rendered Him: “To suffer and to be despised for Your love.” And St. Teresa of Jesus, seeing her earthly exile prolonged, found in suffering embraced for God the only means of appeasing her heart, a thirst for eternal love; and she entreated: “To die, Lord, or to suffer! I ask nothing else of Thee for myself but this” ([[tj-life-ccel-toc|Life]], 40). In heaven we shall have no further need of suffering to prove our love, because then we shall love in the unfailing clarity of the [[beatific-vision|Beatific Vision]]. But here below, where we love in the obscurity of faith, we need to prove to God the reality of our love. ## Meditation 2 “If our love is perfect, it has this quality of leading us to forget our own pleasure in order to please Him whom we love”; it has the power to make us accept our trials with love “and take the bitter with the sweet, knowing that to be His Majesty’s will” ([[teresa-of-avila-saint|T.J.]] [[tj-foundations|F]], 5). Evidently, a love like this cannot be the fruit of our own human nature, which has such repugnance for suffering; it cannot be acquired, for it greatly surpasses the capacity of our nature, so poor and weak. God alone can infuse it little by little into souls who allow Him to guide them by the narrow way of interior purification. Yes, in aridity, in solitude of heart, in the privation of all light and consolation, the Holy Spirit enkindles in them this flame of charity, a flame which invades them increasingly as it finds them well disposed, that is, purified of everything contrary to love. When all resistances have been overcome, all dross eliminated, the flame of love will blaze up irresistibly and. give to the soul the strength of a giant. The flame of love, St. John of the Cross explains, “causes [the soul] to go forth from itself, and be wholly renewed and enter upon another mode of being” (SC, 1,7). While formerly the soul feared and fled suffering, now it embraces it courageously. The soul strongest in suffering is also the strongest in love. No creature in the world loved, nor will love God more than the most Blessed Virgin Mary, and none was, nor ever will be, stronger than she in suffering. See her at the foot of the Cross: she is a Mother, and she voluntarily assists at the terrible agony of her Son; she sees the nails being driven into His Flesh; she hears the heavy blows of the hammer; she beholds His Head crowned with thorns, vainly seeking a little repose on the hard wood of the Cross; she sees the Cross raised and her Son hanging on it, suspended between heaven and earth, disfigured by suffering, without the least consolation. Mary’s heart was pierced; nevertheless, she repeated her fiat with the same fullness of consent with which she had pronounced it at the joyous annunciation of her maternity. In her love, she found courage to offer her well-beloved Son for the salvation of His executioners. What mother could rival Our Lady in strength? Yet her sacrifice immeasurably surpassed that of any other mother because only she could say: The Son whom I immolate is my God. Let us learn the secret of strong love at the foot of the Cross beside Mary, Queen of Martyrs, through love and suffering. ## Colloquy “He who truly loves You, Lord, has only one ambition, that of pleasing You. He dies with desire to be loved by You, and so will give his life to learn how he may please You better. Can such love remain hidden? No, my God, that is impossible! There are degrees of love, for love shows itself in proportion to its strength. If it is weak, it shows itself but little. If it is strong, it shows itself a great deal. But love always makes itself known, whether weak or strong, provided it is real love. “O Lord, grant that my love be not the fruit of my imagination but be proved by works. What can I do for You, who died for us and created us and gave us being, without counting myself fortunate in being able to repay You something of what I owe You? “May it be Your pleasure, O Lord, that the day may finally come in which I shall be able to pay. You at least something of all I owe You. Cost what it may, Lord, permit me not to come into Your presence with empty hands, since the reward must be in accordance with my works. Well do I know, my Lord, of how little I am capable. But I shall be able to do all things provided You do not withdraw from me. “It is not You that are to blame, my Lord, if those who love You do no great deeds; it is our weak-mindedness and cowardice. It is because we never make firm resolutions but are filled with a thousand fears and scruples arising from human prudence, that You, my God, do not work Your marvels and wonders. Who loves more than You to give, if You have anyone that will receive; or to accept services performed at our own cost? May Your Majesty grant me to have rendered You some service and to care about nothing save returning to You some part of all I have received” ([[teresa-of-avila-saint|T.J.]] [[tj-way-ccel-toc|Way]], 40 — Int C II, 1 — Life, 21 - F, 2). --- ## Reference Int C - [[tj-interior-castle-ccel|Interior Castle]] T.J - [[teresa-of-avila-saint|Saint Teresa of Jesus]] Way - [[tj-way-ccel-toc|The Way of Perfection]] # References J.C. - [[john-of-the-cross-saint|Saint John of the Cross]] DN - [[jc-dark-night-toc|Dark Night of the Soul by Saint John of the Cross]] SC - [[jc-s-canticle-toc|Spiritual Canticle by Saint John of the Cross]] T.J. - [[teresa-of-avila-saint|Saint Teresa of Avila]] F - [[tj-foundations|Foundations by Saint Teresa of Avila]] Int C - [[tj-interior-castle-ccel|Interior Castle (Mansions) by Saint Teresa of Avila]] Life - [[tj-life-ccel-toc|Life by Saint Teresa of Avila]] Way - [[tj-way-ccel-toc|Way of Perfection by Saint Teresa of Avila]] --- ![[bibliography#^biblio-di]] > [[359-humble-and-reverent-love|← 359. Humble and Reverent Love]] | [[-divine-intimacy-toc|TOC]] | [[361-unitive-love|361. Unitive Love →]]