St John of the Cross on trials

[TominAdelaide]

Some good quotes from St John of the Cross on trials:

From Prologue and Sayings 1-79, no 54:

It is not God’s will that a soul should be disturbed by anything or suffer trials, for if one suffers trials in the adversities of the world it is because of a weakness in virtue. The perfect soul rejoices in what afflicts the imperfect one.

From Sayings 159 – 175, no. 174:

As for trials, the more the better.

 

[Shakuhachi]

I love John of the Cross but sometimes he seems beyond most of us. Don’t we usually pray to be delivered from trials? This is especially so when we are in the midst of them.

And many people simply do not accept his apophatic spirituality.

But he is right. Trials are part of our purgation.

 

[TominAdelaide]

Most theologians would say that love of the cross is something that gradually progresses over a lifetime:

From St Alphonsus Liguori (On the Advantages of Tribulation):

Not infrequently a man is so strengthened by his love of trials and hardship in his desire to conform to the cross of Christ, that he does not wish to be without sorrow or pain, since he believes he will be the more acceptable to God if he is able to endure more and more grievous things for His sake.

From St Louis de Montfort (Friends of the Cross):

Ask any of the saints, and they will tell you they have never tasted a banquet more delicious for the spirit than when undergoing the severest torments. “Let all the torments of the devil come upon me,” said St. Ignatius the Martyr. “Let me suffer or die,” said St. Teresa of Avila. “Not death but suffering,” said St. Mary Magdalene of Pazzi. “May I suffer and be despised for your sake,” said St John of the Cross. And many others have spoken in the same terms, as we read in their lives.

From St Louis de Montfort (Friends of the Cross):

Whenever you receive any cross, always welcome it with humility and gratitude. And when God favors you with a cross of some importance, show your gratitude in a special way, and get others to thank him for you. Follow the example of the poor woman who lost all that she had in an unjust law-suit and immediately offered her few remaining coins to have a Mass said in thanksgiving for her good fortune.

From St Louis de Montfort (Friends of the Cross):

Insults from men were the great objects of the desires of the saints, who sought to be despised for the love of Jesus Christ, and thus to be made like unto him.

From St John Climacus (The Ladder of Divine Ascent):

Freedom from anger is an endless wish for dishonor, where as among the vainglorious there is a limitless thirst for praise.

From St John Climacus (The Ladder of Divine Ascent):

The first stage of blessed patience is to accept dishonor with bitterness and anguish of soul. The intermediate stage is to be free from pain amid such things. The perfect stage is to think of dishonor as praise.

From St John Climacus (The Ladder of Divine Ascent):

Those making some progress in blessed patience are usually temperate and untalkative. Those who have succeeded in making real progress do not become angry and do not bear grudges. As for the perfect – these are humble, they long for dishonor, they look out for involuntary sufferings, they do not condemn sinners and they are inordinately compassionate. The first kind are acceptable, the second praiseworthy, but blessed surely are those who hunger for suffering and thirst for dishonor, for they will be filled to abundance with the food that cannot satiate them.

 

[TominAdelaide]

From Fr Gabriel of St Mary Magdalen (Divine Intimacy):

But let us have no illusions: the love of suffering is the summit of patience; it is the fruit of patience brought to perfection. To reach this height, we must begin with a much humbler practice; that is, the peaceful and uncomplaining acceptance of everything that makes us suffer.

From Fr Gabriel of St Mary Magdalen (Divine Intimacy):

It is true that that these occasions are not agreeable to proud, sensitive nature; nevertheless, although we feel their bitterness, we must force ourselves to accept them graciously, making the words of the Psalmist our own: “It is good for me that Thou hast humbled me.” (Ps 118:71) If, in spite of all the repugnance and resistance of nature, we accept a humiliation by an act of the will, and assure God that we want to be content with it and to savor it thoroughly, we will gradually become humble. The hard, bitter bread of abasement will become little by little, sweet and pleasant, but we will not find it agreeable until we have been nourished by it for a long time. Moreover, the most important thing is not the sweetness, but the willingness to accept everything that is humiliating. “Allow thyself to be taught, allow thyself to be commanded, allow thyself to be enslaved and brought into submission and despised, and thou shall be perfect!” (St John of the Cross, Spiritual Maxims 2, 33)

 

[TominAdelaide]

From Fr Spirago (Catechism Explained):

3 Degrees of Patience

The degrees of patience correspond to the three stages of the spiritual life.

a) At the beginning, suffering is accepted as coming from God; without murmur, without resentment, in hope of heavenly rewards. It is accepted in order to atone for faults and to purify the heart; in order to control ill-regulated tendencies, especially sadness and dejection. It is accepted in spite of our natural repugnance, and, if a prayer goes up that the chalice pass away, it is followed by an act of submission to the holy Will of God.

b) Patience, in its second degree, makes us eager to embrace suffering, in union with Jesus Christ, and in order to make us more like that Divine Model. Hence the soul is fond of following Him along the sorrowful road that He took from the Crib to the Cross; it contemplates Him, praises Him, and pours forth its love upon Him in all His sorrowful mysteries: at His entrance into this world when He “emptied Himself”; in His resignation within the lowly crib that was His cradle and wherein He suffered even more from the insensibility of men than from the cold and the elements; amidst the sufferings of His exile, the menial labors of His hidden life, the work, the fatigue, and the humiliations of His public life; but, above all, in the physical and moral tortures of His painful passion. Strengthened by the words of St. Peter, “Christ therefore, having suffered in the flesh, be you also armed with the same thought,” the soul takes new courage in the face of pain and sadness; side by side with Jesus, it tenderly stretches itself forth on the Cross, for love of Him: “With Christ I am nailed to the cross.” When suffering increases, a loving, compassionate glance upon the Crucified Christ brings the response from His lips: “Blessed are they that mourn … blessed are they who suffer persecution for justice’s sake.”

Then, the hope of sharing in His glory in the heavenly places renders more bearable the crucifixion undergone in union with Him: “If we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified with him.” Nay, the soul at times comes, like St. Paul, to the point where it rejoices in its miseries and tribulations, well knowing that to suffer with Christ means to comfort Him, that it means the completion of His Passion, a more perfect love for Him here on earth, and a preparation for the further enjoyment of His love through all eternity: “Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may dwell in me … I exceedingly abound with joy in all our tribulation.”

 

[TominAdelaide]

From Fr Spirago (Catechism Explained):

3 Degrees of Patience

c) This leads to the third degree of patience, the desire and the love of suffering for the sake of God Whom one wishes to glorify, and for the sake of souls, for whose sanctification one wants to labor. This is the degree proper to perfect souls and especially to apostolic souls, to religious, priests and devout men and women. Such was the disposition that animated Our Blessed Lord when He offered Himself as victim at His entrance into this world, and which He expressed in proclaiming His desire to suffer the baptism of His Passion: “And I have a baptism wherewith I am to be baptized. And how am I straitened until it be accomplished.” Out of love for Him and in order to become more like unto Him, perfect souls enter into the same sentiments: “For”, in the words of St. Ignatius, “just as men of the world who are attached to the things of earth, love and seek with great eagerness honors, good name, and display among men … so those who march ahead in the ways of the spirit and who earnestly follow Jesus Christ love and ardently desire whatever is opposed to the spirit of the world … so that were it possible with no offence to God and scandal to the neighbor, they would want to suffer insults, slanders, and injuries, be reckoned as fools, though having given no occasion therefor, such is their intense desire to be likened in some way to Our Lord Jesus Christ … so that with the help of His grace we strive to imitate Him as far as we can, and to follow Him in all things, since He is the true way which leads men to life.” Evidently, it is only love for God and for the Crucified Christ that can inspire a like love for the Cross and humiliations.

Must a soul go further, and offer itself to God as a victim and formally ask God for extraordinary sufferings, in order either to offer reparation to God, or to obtain some signal favor? No doubt some of the Saints have done so and in our day there are still generous souls who are moved to do likewise. However, generally speaking, such requests cannot be prudently counselled. They may easily lead to illusions and are often the outcome of some ill-considered impulse of generosity which has its origin in presumption. “Such requests are made,” says Father de Smedt, “in moments of emotional fervor, and once this is gone … one realizes one’s weakness to accomplish the heroic acts of submission and resignation so energetically made in the imagination. Therefrom issue violent temptations to discouragement and even to complaints against God’s Providence … It is a source of great annoyance and perplexity to the spiritual directors of such souls.” Hence, we must not take it upon ourselves to ask for extraordinary sufferings or trials. If one feels oneself drawn thereto, one must take counsel with a judicious director of souls and do nothing without his approval.

 

[TominAdelaide]

From St Louis de Montfort (Friends of the Cross):

When we are told to love the cross, that does not refer to an emotional love, impossible to our human nature.

There are three kinds of love: emotional love, rational love, and the supernatural love of faith. In other words, the love that resides in the lower part of man, in his body; the love in the higher part, his reason; and the love in the highest part of man, in the summit of the soul, that is, the intelligence enlightened by faith.

God does not ask you to love the cross with the will of the flesh. Since the flesh is subject to sin and corruption, all that proceeds from it is perverted and, of itself, cannot be submissive to the will of God and his crucifying law. It was this human will our Lord referred to in the Garden of Olives when he cried out, “Father, let your will be done, not mine.” If the lower part of Christ’s human nature, although so holy, could not love the cross continuously, then with still greater reason will our tainted nature reject it. It is true that we may sometimes experience even a sensible joy in our sufferings, as many of the saints have done; but that joy does not come from the body, even though it is experienced in the body. It comes from the soul, which is so overwhelmed with the divine joy of the Holy Spirit that it overflows into the body. In that way, someone who is suffering greatly can say with the psalmist, “My heart and my flesh ring out their joy to God, the living God.”

There is another love of the cross which I have called rational love and which is in the higher part of man, the mind. This love is entirely spiritual; it springs from the knowledge of how happy we can be in suffering for God, and so it can be experienced by the soul, to which it gives interior joy and strength. But although this rational and perceptible joy is good, in fact, excellent, it is not always necessary in order to suffer joyfully for God’s sake.

And so there is a third kind of love, which is called by the masters of the spiritual life the love of the summit of the soul, and which is known to philosophers as the love of the intellect. In this, without any feeling of joy in the senses or pleasure in the mind, we love the cross we are carrying, by the light of pure faith, and take delight in it, even though the lower part of our nature may be in a state of conflict and disturbance, groaning and complaining, weeping and longing for relief. In this case, we can say with our Lord, “Father, let Your will be done, not mine;” or with our Lady, “I am the slave of the Lord: let what you have said be done to me.”

It is with one of these two higher loves that we should love and accept the cross.

 

[TominAdelaide]

St Therese of Lisieux on her death bed:

“I have reached the point of not being able to suffer any more, because all suffering is sweet to me.”