I only met one person in my entire life who said openly that he had entered the last stage or prayer, Spiritual Marriage. He only told me because I asked him straight out and we were in private conversation. He was a Dominican Archbishop and he gave a beautiful quote from the Holy Office from St Columbanus. St Columbanus compares the soul to a little boat that crosses a stormy sea but in the evening she reaches a little harbour were the sea is quiet and there she takes her rest. That is such a lovely , poetic was of describing the indescribable. St Peter in reading at Mass during the week talks of , 'When the morning star will light your mind'. Which is another lovely description. Or it could be said it is when the soul reaches through night and the moon rather than the sun lights its way. It lives by moonlight so to speak. Or one Mystical Theologian spoke of it as having climbed a high mountain and now walking on a plateau. Annoyingly most writers (such as Teresa of Avila) leave of writing at this point figuring that anyone who has got there does not need such things to be written about. But to me it is like writing a wonderful book but leaving off the ending because the reader can figure out the ending for themselves. Such a pity. https://theconversation.com/how-we-...writing-hut-stashed-in-a-cornish-garage-80778 Beware, my son,” St Columba warned his disciple Berchán. “Do not come to my lodging tonight.” But young Berchán crept to Columba’s house that night, peered through the keyhole, and witnessed a blinding heavenly light. He immediately ran away. The next day the all-seeing saint scolded him. He added with fatherly exasperation: “If I had not in that instant prayed for your sake, you would have dropped dead by the door or else your eyes would have been torn from their sockets”. St Columba. Aidan Hart, CC BY-SA Columba is the Irish monk who became the most important Scottish saint of his era. He founded a monastery in 563AD on Iona, an island off the west coast of Scotland, which became one of the leading intellectual and artistic centres of northern Europe. With the help of stories about miracles such as the one above, Columba is often credited with converting Scotland’s pagan Picts to Christianity.
Could spiritual marriage be the theosis (participation in the divine nature) that the orthodox church says every believer should unceasingly pursue? I wonder if it is possible that the writings of contemplative Carmelite saints like Saint John of the Cross and Saint Teresa of Avila could be an instrument of reunification with the Orthodox in a future ecumenical council and if Carmelite and contemplative spirituality will grow a lot in the Catholic world before the Great Warning, which could be an experienced portion of the Seventh Abode. Perhaps during the great warning, we feel isolated from the superfluous grandeur of the world and more intimately united with God in the way contemplative prayer prepares us.
The Orthodox have a different name for it. The call it Divinisation. Just as you mention...I think. However it goes in a somewhat different kind of Spiritual Route, through the use of the Jesus Prayer. You start of ,say saying it 100 times a day and then go onto a 1000 times and up and up until you are saying it unceasingly. I think you call this Spirituality Heychasm. It requires really good,strict Spiritual Direction or you could go off the deep end. But although the Spiritual Pathway differs in form I would guess it is pretty well the same as the Catholic way. Of Catholics I would say we tend to concentrate more on Knowledge, on the mind than Orthodox. The Easterners are more given to the intuitive, the Mystical and Monastic. They concentrate on the Resurrection and the Transfiguration . Catholics on the other hand I would say centres very much on the Passion and Death of Jesus. Protestantism I would say is pretty well all about the mind, of the use of reason and the poor old Mystical barely gets a look in. St John Paul2 famously said that Eastern and Western Christianity are the two lungs of the Body of the Church. That the Body of Christ needs the two lungs to function. But I would not recommend a Westerner to adopt Eastern Practices nor an Easterner to adopt Western. They are each of them two foreign to what each may be used to. A fundamentally different cultural world.
I would say you can compare Catholic Spiritual Traditions as being like a train that runs on steel laid down tracks. We talk for instance of fixed Spiritual Stages, or Railway Stations. The Easterners are more like a landrover, they don't really do railways stations but are happy to drive about freely. Not to be tied down.
I see the great warning as a kind of "partial theosis" because we will feel within ourselves how God sees us as sinners and how every area of sin in our lives directly offends Our Lord; a radiography of the soul that comes straight from the mind and action of God.
Various saints have described this. The Cure of Ars, one of the holiest and purest saints who ever lived , for instance , once asked God to let him see himself in the Light of God, warts and all. But as soon as God started to show him he cried out in horror and begged God to stop. So if a Great saint could cry out in agony even at the start of this what would we be like? So I don't think any of us go could the whole hog or even a tiny part of the whole hog. But even a chink of it would be quite something. I hear if we ask our Guardian angel to show some light on our sins he will be dying to do so. But this requires great courage or innocence. Even the smallest fault of venial sin is horrific in the light of God. We beg God's Mercy which is great. But we need to show a little mercy to ourselves, I think. We need this mercy so much. We must be careful what we ask for. We have just no idea of the Holiness of God and how far we fall short of it.
If you want to read a really good book, "Everything Is Grace" a biography of St.Therese. It's a wonderful journey and St. Therese takes you on a walk through human-ness and life. Reflecting on her life and how she matured so quickly and deeply. Learn about her 'little way' to take the elevator to heaven! She discusses your comments on holiness with the novices she is teaching and explains our humanity in such a beautiful way.
Thank you. I think the books (there might have been a series of them) that helped me understand St Therese best were conversations she had with other (especially her sisters) running up to her death. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Her-Last-Conversations-St-Therese-Lisieux/dp/096008763X One thing that really struck home to me was that St Theresa appeared to be well aware that she was going to be canonised, declared a saint after her death. This seems to go contrary to what many think of as humility. But humility is simply being grounded in the truth. Like St Paul of Tarsus she knew she had run the race to the finish. I was listening to the last TV interview of Fulton Sheen. During it he said, 'When I get to heaven..' He did not say 'If I get to heaven...'
I’m afraid I’ve feared death, but I won’t fear it after it takes place; I’m sure of this! And I’m not sorry for having lived; oh! no. It’s only when I ask myself: What is this mysterious separation of the soul from the body? It’s my first experience of this, but I abandon myself to God.”
A truly terrible death. They say it is a bit like breathing in glass with every breath. Her Prioress would not pay for morphine as she reckoned Therese did not need it. Her words, 'I never thought it was possible to suffer so much! Never!! Never!! Never!!' are heart stopping. She was severely tempted to suicide and so requested that her medicines be kept out of her reach.
I am not aware of any form of contact between the Carmelite monks and the elders of Mount Athos; even though both groups are dedicated to a life of solitude, silence, contemplation, and prayer, it would be interesting to see what they could share in common in their monastic lives and mystical theology.
I know there is a Jesuit priest who became Orthodox and is now a monk on Mount Athos. May God forgive him. Although I don't suppose it is the worst thing anyone ever did. All the same may God have mercy on his poor soul . The monks on Mount Athos are very hostile indeed to Catholics, I wouldn't expect much ecumenism there and it may be just as well .
I have noticed that many orthodox apologists have a certain arrogance in their apologetics to the point of criticizing St. Thomas Aquinas, but as for the Athonite elders, the contemplative life will become a shorter path to their conversion through the Great Warning ? In one of her interviews, Mari Loli said that during the warning, people would feel alone no matter where they were. I believe that contemplative prayer illustrates this well and, in a certain way, will be an instrument to prepare us as receptacles of the illumination of conscience on the big day.
correcting my post; in fact, Conchita is the one who said this in a 1973 interview: 1973 [GARABANDAL, January – March of 1983.] Q. What will occur on the day of the Warning? A. The most important thing about that day is that everyone in the whole world will see a sign, a grace, or a punishment within themselves - in other words, a Warning. They will find themselves all alone in the world no matter where they are at the time, alone with their conscience right before God. They will then see all their sins and what their sins have caused. Q. Will we all feel it at the same time? A. Yes, at the same time. Q. How long will it last, a half hour, an hour? A. I really don't know. I think that five minutes would be an adequate time. Q. How will we feel it? A. We will all feel it differently because it will depend on our conscience. The Warning will be very personal; therefore, we will all react differently to it. The most important thing will be to recognize our own sins and the bad consequences of them. You will have a different view of the Warning than me because your sins are different from mine. Q. Will something happen to me because of my sins? I mean will physical harm come upon me as a result of them? A. No, unless it's something that results from the shock, for example, a heart attack. Q. So then it will bring no physical harm but will consist in facing God alone with my sins. How about the good things; will I see them also? A. No. This will be only a Warning to see what sins you have committed. It will be like a purification before the Miracle to see if with the Warning and Miracle we (meaning the whole world) will convert. Q. So this Warning can occur any day now? A. Yes, but I don't know the date when it will occur. https://garabandal.it/en/vive-garabandal/visita/otros-lugares?id=60
The Orthodox believe Catholics are guilty of the Heresy (amongst others ) of Scholasticism. The heresy of the great Catholic schools such as the University of Paris. Of trying to think our way to heaven too much. Of trying to put the Holy Spirit in a kind of rational box. I can't help thinking that this kind of hostility towards the Church which many Jews and Protestants share might well stem from a sense of guilt.
I honestly don't think many modern Western Catholic feel and kind of hostility like this. At one time, yes. But I like to think it is almost gone, a very good sign. I would love to visit Mount Athos, but I would never dream of going where I am very much not wanted. Anyway you need all kinds of special permissions as a Catholic to visit.
