Hello, recently I have felt myself becoming very cold. I do my best to love God but just feel cold. I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. Has anyone else had this experience? I also feel quite dry in prayer. I do my best not to sin, I do penance and mortification, I pray a lot of my day and meditate for an hour daily but I have only recently been feeling cold, for example usually I got many spiritual consolations before the Blessed Sacrament but now I feel nothing but dryness. Any advice on how to overcome it? I don’t think it’s the dark night since you have to go through other stages like the purgation and illumination before you reach that. I would say I’m definantly in the lowest stage! Any advice would be greatly appreciated, God Bless
Hi there
I think it might help you to read the book “Dark Night of the Soul” by St John of the Cross, not because this is the dark night of the soul necessarily, but because he also talks about dark night of the senses too and gives advice on how to tell if this is what you have
it can also really help to speak with a knowledgeable priest.
From what I remember from St John of the Cross… first, when a person finds God in the beginning, there are a lot of spiritual consolations… later on, God begins to purify them to make their love for Him more spiritual, so they’re not so attached to feelings and consolations. This is the “dark night of the senses”. You don’t have to go through illumination etc to reach this stage; it’s given to many people who have experienced consolations.
It’s quite common. During this time, the person seeks to love God, but they don’t feel anything except aridity. St John says, there are ways to tell if this is really the dark night of the senses, - or something else like unrepented sin, etc. Ask yourself some questions… - do you find consolation in the world during this time? (if you do, then it’s probably not the dark night). Do you try hard to repent of sin? Do you try to pray and to love God? Do you have any unrepented sin? Do you receive the Sacraments regularly? If you are trying to do all those things and this is not the result of sin, then it’s a purification and is indeed a good thing for you spiritually
try to just rely on the will during this time, don’t neglect any of your spiritual practices or duties, and keep going, without feelings. In time, when you are sufficiently purified at this time, you will feel God’s presence again. But remember love is in the will, not in feelings.
After the dark night of the senses (often people might have several, during their life, I guess) - the person continues to grow, and if they really advance in the spiritual life they might come to the dark night of the soul. This is something different and only a few reach it. I think maybe it’s a type of purgatory, so if you go through that, you won’t need purgatory anymore and would live in a type of union with God, here on earth. St John describes it well in his book, though I never got a chance to finish reading.
God bless
