When the heart is burning with love for God,
The soul is contemplating lamps of fire,
Which enlighten all things…
Divine perfections:
Wisdom, Goodness, Mercy, Justice, Providence, Omnipotence.
The colours of the divine rainbow,
Without destroying one another…
Identified in the intimate life of God,
In the Deity,
The seven colours of the rainbow…
United in the one light…
“All these are one lamp,
Which is the Word. . . .
This lamp
All these lamps,
Give light,
Burn in all these ways.”
Living Flame St John of the Cross
The powers of the soul…
Melted in the splendour of the divine lamps….
Truly a prelude to eternal life.
“The soul is completely absorbed in these delicate flames,
Wounded subtly in each of them,
In all of them more deeply
Subtly wounded in love of life,
See quite clearly,
That love belongs to life eternal,
The union of all blessings…..
The lamps of love,
Lamps of fire and flame.”
The flame which the wise virgins must tend in their lamps,
A participation of this flame…
Canticle of Canticles
The divine love is a consuming fire.
It penetrates the soul to its depth.
It burns and consumes,
But does not destroy;
It transforms into itself.
Material fire burns wood to its innermost fibers,
Iron to its last molecules,
An image of that fire,
How feeble an image!
At times, under a specially powerful grace,
The soul that is on fire with divine love sends forth flames.
They ascend straight to God.
God  is their principle
God is their end;
It is for God’s sake that the soul is consumed with love…..
St. John of the Cross compares the soul penetrated by God
With the union of air and fire in a flame,
Nothing else but air on fire…..
God by His action enters so intimately…
God deifies the purified soul.
Sanctifying grace.
Sanctifying grace a real and formal participation,
God’s inner life,
God’s own nature…
Unitive love…
The soul like a sea of fire
Reaches to the farthest heights and depths,
Filled wholly with a fiery love.
St John of the Cross Living Flame
Hardly perceptible at first,
More and more it grows,
The soul experiences an ever-increasing hunger for God
A burning thirst,
The Psalmist says:
“For thee my soul hath thirsted;
For thee my flesh, O, how many ways!”
True be attitude, (beautiful attitude)…
Those that hunger and thirst after justice;
The prelude to the life of heaven,
Truly a beginning of eternal life…
The life of grace on earth,
The seed of glory…
Too sublime for us poor mortals?
… too sublime…
Baptism: life of grace…
Must develop into eternal life…
Holy Communion increase that grace within…
More fervent than the preceding,
Too increase the love of God in us,
Thus dispose us to receive our Lord with a greater fervor…
St. John of the Cross says,
Spiritual souls that desire union,
Would attain it if they did not flee,
The trials which God sends for purification…
Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena…
“If any man thirst let him come to me and drink…
Out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.”
“You were all invited,
Generally and in particular,
By God’s Truth,
Our Lord cried in the Temple,
‘If any man thirst,
Let him come to me and drink’
Invited to the fountain of living water,
Grace: it is right for you,
With perseverance keep by Jesus.
Christ is a bridge,
Do not be turned away,
Contrary winds will arise,
Either of prosperity or adversity,
Persevere until you find God,
Who offers the water of Life,
By means of this sweet Word of love:
My only-begotten Son…..”
You must have thirst,
Only those that thirst are invited.
‘If any man thirst,’
‘Let him come to me and drink.’
He who has no thirst will not persevere,
Either fatigue causes him to stop,
Or pleasure distracts him . . .
He turns back at the smallest persecution…
The intellect must gaze into the ineffable love…
My only-begotten Son. . . .
A man who is full of My love,
The love of his neighbour
Finds himself the companion of many real virtues;
And then the soul is disposed to thirst:
It thirsts for virtue,
The honour of God’s name and
The salvation of souls;
Every other thirst is spent and dead.
The soul then walks securely…
Stripped of self-love;
Raised above itself,
Above transitory things…
It contemplates the profound love,
I have manifested in Christ crucified…
The heart, emptied of the things that pass away,
Becomes filled with heavenly love,
Granted access to the waters of grace.
Having arrived,
The soul passes through
The door of Christ crucified,
Tasting the water of life,
Slaking his thirst in Jesus,
Christ the Ocean of Peace.