Love is something which IS

Love is something which IS. Not having to be talked about, it expresses itself in your life as naturally as breathing. Reflecting itself in your being and attitude, it is the real you. Love is the Beloved within you. Love is absolutely free. It can never be boxed up, for that is not divine love; that is human possessive love which cannot withstand the stresses and strains in life. Divine love is limitless and able to withstand anything. The little self and its reactions are pushed out of the way when divine love flows freely in and through a soul. With pure love in your heart you can go anywhere, face anyone, for you have within you the strength of God's divine love.

Sometimes I seek another word to express the word love

Sometimes I seek another word to express the word 'love'; but in this land of exile the word which begins and ends is quite incapable of rendering the vibrations of the soul: we must then adhere to the simple and only word: To Love.

February 1990 (Vol. III, No. 2)

WARM GREETINGS to all Friends of Silence! Every once in a while it seems good to give thanks to all the friends -- living and dead -- who offer the gift of their guidance and insights by way of writing. Books like THE CLOUD UNKNOWING ... one can only marvel and be grateful for the simple, radical and profound guidance that unknown author offers for the life of solitude, silence and prayer appropriate to all times:

This is what you are to do: Love God. Go to a quiet place. Calm yourself. And with a gentle stirring of love lift your heart up to God, loving God not for any gifts, but instead, love God for God's sake alone. Sitting thus, do not think about the presence of feelings that God is near. Do not cling to any thought of God, regardless of how sublime the thought might be. Do not pray for anyone or for yourself, regardless of the immensity of the need. Let your love for God alone be your sole concern. Of course, you will make mistakes, for, after all, you do not know what you are doing. You do not know how to life up your heart "with a gentle stirring of love." The very simplicity and radicality of what you are led to do leads you into the obscurity of the contemplative way. But no matter, led by God's promptings you learn (without knowing how) to listen to God's gentle stirrings of love within you. As the gentle stirring is meek, so, too, is your lifting up of it to God. As it is unseen, beyond the reach of your power to comprehend it, so, too, is your lifting up of this stirring. As it is fiery and mighty, so, too, your humble self-offering to God, loving God for God's own sake.

~ from THE AWAKENING CALL by James Finley
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"The meaning of our life is a secret that has to be revealed to us in love ... by the one we love.
~ Thomas Merton
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Two medieval mystics, Hildegard and Hadewijch, are models in a distinctive way. Their willingness to become passionately involved with Christ made them alive with love. They are not boring. Their lives teem with intense participation in life. They said yes to being in love, to the dangers and tribulations of that state as well as to its joys and satisfactions ... Each of these women stand as reminders that we are not alone in our choice to live and love with passion. They knew intimately a passionate God who freely and generously invited them to share in that passion. They responded affirmatively and call us to do the same. The passion of God is guaranteed to call us out from the moral security of obedience to the law toward our own deepest humanity. Passion involves a transformation in which service to others, healing, relief, comfort, hope and forgiveness take on a radically new character. The person who has allowed passion to have its way returns to love and life and service with new verve and feeling. The experience of passion wounds with the fire of love and opens the door to the utter fullness of humanity in God.

~ from PASSIONATE WOMEN by Elizabeth Dreyer
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My Beloved is the mountains,
And lonely wooded valleys,
Strange islands,
And resounding rivers,
The whistling of love-stirring breezes,
The tranquil night
At the time of rising dawn,
Silent music,
Sounding solitude,
The supper that refreshes and deepens love.

~ St. John of the Cross
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There is nothing which cannot be borne with cheerful alacrity by those who love one another.
~ St. Teresa
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The saints speak of something they call the inextinguishable light. It is a light not of the eye but of the heart that never ceases to walk in purity and clearness. It swiftly leaves the darkness behind, and constantly strives towards the day's height. Its constant quality is to be continually purified. This is the light of eternity that can never go out, and that shines through the veil of time and matter. The saints never say that this light is given to them, but that it is given only to those who have purified their hearts in love for the Lord, on the narrow way which they have freely chosen.

~ from THE WAY OF THE ASCETICS by Tito Colliander
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Love is something which IS. Not having to be talked about, it expresses itself in your life as naturally as breathing. Reflecting itself in your being and attitude, it is the real you. Love is the Beloved within you. Love is absolutely free. It can never be boxed up, for that is not divine love; that is human possessive love which cannot withstand the stresses and strains in life. Divine love is limitless and able to withstand anything. The little self and its reactions are pushed out of the way when divine love flows freely in and through a soul. With pure love in your heart you can go anywhere, face anyone, for you have within you the strength of God's divine love.

~ from FLIGHT INTO FREEDOM by Eileen Caddy
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Sometimes I seek another word to express the word 'love'; but in this land of exile the word which begins and ends is quite incapable of rendering the vibrations of the soul: we must then adhere to the simple and only word: To Love.

~ St. Therese of Liseaux
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"We are in God and God, whom we do not see, is in us."
~ Julian of Norwich
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We are in God

"We are in God and God, whom we do not see, is in us."

How do we prepare ourselves

How do we prepare ourselves to respond to crises, to conflict, to the Christ moment? How do we so open ourselves to Love that the fears which paralyze us are overcome? "I have found in my own life and through conversations with others that people need more and more to see the connection between ordinary reality and extraordinary grace, between everyday events and the divine mystery manifested in them. As this sensitivity to the sacred increases, we desire to give high priority to the person-to-person relationship that exists between the pilgrim soul and God. Only through the strength derived from this bond is it possible to give ourselves in turn to the service of others in the world."

When disaster comes unexpected

When disaster comes unexpected, we discover the strength of our underpinning faith. Such was the destiny of a mother in Armenia:

When the earthquake hit, a mother and her child plummeted several stories as their apartment building crumpled. They were trapped in a tiny space in the basement barely able to move amidst the rubble. Dressed only in her slip and pinned down by beams, the mother --- thrust into a long, uninterrupted silence -- comforted her child for eight days and eight nights with her love. When the child had finished one jar of jam that had landed near them, she kept begging her mother for something to drink. Realizing they would both die without water, the mother scratched as far she could reach and found a shard of glass. One by one, she cut her fingers and hour by hour, she fed her child her own life blood. One the ninth day the rescuers found them. Out of the cold, dark prison, they were raised to new life.

There is but one solitude

There is but one solitude, and that is great, and not easy to bear, and to almost everybody come hours when they would gladly exchange it for any sort of intercourse, however banal and cheap, for the semblance of some slight accord with the first comer ... But perhaps those are the very hours when solitude grows; for its growing is painful ... But that must not mislead you. The necessary thing is after all but this: solitude, great inner solitude. Going-into-oneself and for hours meeting no one -- this one must be able to attain. To be solitary, the way one was solitary as a child ... Think of the world you carry within you ... What goes on in your innermost being is worthy of your whole love ...

Those in love have a secret

Those in love have a secret. Their gestures and voices and eyes communicate it. They rush to "wake the dawn" and warn the world of love's peculiar logic. They speak a new language and walk with new grace. They learn the dance of life, listening and opening, the rhythm of intimacy and ecstasy. They reverberate with the cosmos as it breathes in unison and blends the sources of silence and sound.

February 1989 (Vol. II, No. 2)

Warm greetings to all Friends of Silence this month of Valentine love, celebrated so commercially, and the beginning of Lent -- the journey to the Passion of Christ, celebrated in the hermitage of each hear where Love abides. While Valentine's Day invites us to express love and affection to special people in our lives, Lent calls us to reflect, pray and respond to Love that lives in the suffering world. One cannot be a contemplative and be spared the Cross ... the cries of the poor, the anguish of injustice and oppression, the agonies of those afflicted by war, disease, famine, disasters, the raping of our mother earth ... One only has to read the daily news to encounter over and over again the Cross.

How do we prepare ourselves to respond to crises, to conflict, to the Christ moment? How do we so open ourselves to Love that the fears which paralyze us are overcome? "I have found in my own life and through conversations with others that people need more and more to see the connection between ordinary reality and extraordinary grace, between everyday events and the divine mystery manifested in them. As this sensitivity to the sacred increases, we desire to give high priority to the person-to-person relationship that exists between the pilgrim soul and God. Only through the strength derived from this bond is it possible to give ourselves in turn to the service of others in the world."

~ Dr. Susan Muto
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When disaster comes unexpected, we discover the strength of our underpinning faith. Such was the destiny of a mother in Armenia:

When the earthquake hit, a mother and her child plummeted several stories as their apartment building crumpled. They were trapped in a tiny space in the basement barely able to move amidst the rubble. Dressed only in her slip and pinned down by beams, the mother --- thrust into a long, uninterrupted silence -- comforted her child for eight days and eight nights with her love. When the child had finished one jar of jam that had landed near them, she kept begging her mother for something to drink. Realizing they would both die without water, the mother scratched as far she could reach and found a shard of glass. One by one, she cut her fingers and hour by hour, she fed her child her own life blood. One the ninth day the rescuers found them. Out of the cold, dark prison, they were raised to new life.

In this one microcosmic miracle, the love & faith of the mother, the trust of the child, the prayers of the family, friends and neighbors, the concerned commitment of the rescuers, the silent contemplatives of the world were all united heart-to-heart by macrocosmic Love. "The secret of spirituality is the uncovering of this kind of life exchange, this very real and very visible interconnectedness that makes all of creation ONE."

~ Sr. Joan Puls, OSF
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There is but one solitude, and that is great, and not easy to bear, and to almost everybody come hours when they would gladly exchange it for any sort of intercourse, however banal and cheap, for the semblance of some slight accord with the first comer ... But perhaps those are the very hours when solitude grows; for its growing is painful ... But that must not mislead you. The necessary thing is after all but this: solitude, great inner solitude. Going-into-oneself and for hours meeting no one -- this one must be able to attain. To be solitary, the way one was solitary as a child ... Think of the world you carry within you ... What goes on in your innermost being is worthy of your whole love ...

~ Rainer Maria Rilke
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Those in love have a secret. Their gestures and voices and eyes communicate it. They rush to "wake the dawn" and warn the world of love's peculiar logic. They speak a new language and walk with new grace. They learn the dance of life, listening and opening, the rhythm of intimacy and ecstasy. They reverberate with the cosmos as it breathes in unison and blends the sources of silence and sound.

~ from EVERY BUSH IS BURNING: A SPIRITUALITY FOR OUR TIMES by Joan Puls, OSF
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Where this is no love, put love.Love and you will find love.
~ St. John of the Cross
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