The desire of heaven and the love of God. It is long since we came to realize the emptiness, the powerlessness, the nothingness of this life with its false goods, and, forsaking the world, entered the cloister to seek the Sovereign Good alone. In the measure in which our souls have detached and purified themselves, the desire of heaven has become stronger, and the ardor of our love of God increased almost to impatience. All we want is God, God seen, loved, possessed without delay. True, the God of our hearts is here, quite close to us, in the Blessed Sacrament. But we want Him without any concealing veil. Sometimes He permits us to find Him in prayer. But we are not satisfied with such a transient and incomplete union. We would hold Him in perfect and everlasting possession. Our bodies stand like the walls of a prison between our souls and our Well-Beloved. Down with them, therefore; let them cease to hide from us the Sole Object of all our affections! –Abbot Vitalis Lehodey ‘Holy Abandonment’
THE CLOISTERED HEART IS a way of living for God in the midst of the world. It is heart monasticism that can be embraced by married or single persons, religious or lay. It’s an analogy in which our lives can be “monasteries,” our hearts can live in the “enclosure” of Christ, and all things may be viewed through the will of God as through a “grille.” —Nancy Shuman
