I am wondering if we’re not blending situations that are different.
- Mary was alone and missing consolation, but it was human consolation, not spiritual consolation.
In Mystical Theology, the Spanish Mystics (Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross) speak to us about consolation, but they are speaking about spiritual consolation, which was always available to Mary, because she was the Immaculate Conception. Mary’s soul did not need to be purified or to purge itself. Therefore, there was no need to go through spiritual dryness or a dark night of the soul.
During spiritual consolation the soul experiences God’s closeness through the senses. It feels God’s presence. God never deprived Mary of this experience, for she was without sin. Mary never goes through the stages that lead to union with God. She was united to God from the moment of her immaculate conception.
The rest of us have to go through the steps that the Spanish Masters called the Ascent to Mt. Carmel. We begin with the spritual consolation. During this stage our soul is filled with great love for God and our sense are highly aware of God’s presence and action in our lives. Our prayer is filled with love and security.
As we become proficient in prayer, God leads the soul into the desert where prayer becomes an act of a loving will. This has nothing to do with our ability to connect or identify with a saint or with God. In fact, while the soul goes through this phase, which can last decades, the ordinary feelings of eveyday life are always present. The individual can laugh, cry, work, play and do everything that he or she has always been able to do. The person can identify with the saints and with Christ in some way. It’s the soul that feels nothing. In fact, a true saint actually prays harder to the Lord and to Mary, usually for light.
What they don’t always realize is that they cannot see the light, because it’s too strong. It’s as if someone flashed a camera in your face. You’re blinded. The soul in the desert cannot see God, not because he is absent, but because his light is blinding.
As the soul journeys through the desert, what keeps the person going is their faith in God and Mary’s proximity, even though they do not feel it in prayer. The person is aware that the dryness of prayer is a sign of a deeper union with Christ on the cross. The cross was not filled with consolations. It was dark, cloudy, frightening, and dry of all those good feelings that we normally associate with the holy. Yet, it was the ultimate union between God and man. The aridity of the soul in prayer is part of the journey of the soul toward the mystical marriage of which St. Catherine wrote.
- The inability to identify with a saint, such as the Blessed Virgin Mary is a psychological inability, not part of the spiritual journey through the desert.
In speaking of our ability to identify with Mary, we must separate the two experiencess. An inability to connect with Mary, especially for a convert to the Catholic faith is not so much a spiritual experience, but a psychological reality.
It is difficult to connect with someone who has not been part of your spiritual heritage. It is like marrying a widow who has children. Intellectually you accept them as yours too, but it takes time and patience to make the emotional connection. It will come as long as the mind gives assent.
The same applies to our psychological connection to Mary and the saints. As long as our will gives assent, the actual grace will work gradually and thoroughly within us.
Pray for me.
Fraternally,
JR
