‘Works’ – Saint Elisabeth of the Trinity - I. HEAVEN IN FAITH - Seventh Day – First & Second Prayer; points 22-25; pages 9-10
[Saint Elisabeth of the Trinity/Elizabeth Catez – XIX-XX Century; born: Avord, France/died: Dijon, France; (aged 26); Mystic; Spiritual Writer; Gifted Pianist]Seventh Day
First prayer
22. “God chose us in Him before creation, that we should be holy and immaculate in His presence, in love.” (Ep 1:4) “The Holy Trinity created us in its image, according to the eternal design that it possessed in its bosom before the world was created,” (Ruysbroeck) in this “beginning without beginning” of which Bossuet speaks following St. John: “In principio erat Verbum.” Jn 1:1)
In the beginning was the Word; and we could add: in the beginning was nothing, for God in His eternal solitude already carried us in His thought.
“The Father contemplates Himself” “in the abyss of His fecundity, and by the very act of comprehending Himself He engendered another person, the Son, His eternal Word. The archetype of all creatures who had not yet issued out of the void eternally dwelt in Him, and God saw them and contemplated them in their type in Himself. This eternal life which our archetypes possessed without us in God, is the cause of our creation.”
23. “Our created essence asks to be rejoined with its principle.” (Ruysbroeck) The Word, “the Splendor of the Father, is the eternal archetype after which creatures are designed on the day of their creation.”
This is “why God wills that, freed from ourselves, we should stretch out our arms towards our exemplar and possess it,” “rising” above all things “towards our model.” “This contemplation opens” the soul “to unexpected horizons.”
“In a certain manner it possesses the crown towards which it aspires.” (Ruysbroeck) “The immense riches that God possesses by nature, we may possess by virtue of love, by His dwelling in us and by our dwelling in Him.” (Ruysbroeck) “It is by virtue of this immense love” (Ruysbroeck) that we are drawn into the depths of the “intimate sanctuary” where God “imprints on us a true image of His majesty.” (Ruysbroeck) Thus it is, thanks to love and through love, as the Apostle says, that we can be holy and immaculate in God’s presence, and can sing with David: “I will be unblemished and I will guard myself from the depths of sinfulness within me.” (Ps 17:24)
Second prayer
24. “Be holy for I am holy.” (1 Pe 1:16) It is the Lord who speaks.
“Whatever may be our way of life or the clothing we wear, each of us must be the holy one of God.” (Ruysbroeck) Who then is “the most holy”? “The one who is most loving, who gazes longest on God and who most fully satisfies the desires of His gaze.” (Ruysbroeck) How do we satisfy the desires of God’s gaze but by remaining “simply and lovingly” (Saint John of the Cross) turned towards Him so that He may reflect His own image as the sun is reflected through a pure crystal. “Let us make man in our own image and likeness” (Gn 1:26): such was the great desire in the Heart of our God. “Without the likeness which comes from grace, eternal damnation awaits us. When God sees that we are prepared to receive His grace, His generous goodness is ready to give us the gift that will give us His likeness. Our aptitude for receiving His grace depends on the inner integrity with which we move towards Him.” And then God, “bringing us His gifts,” can “give Himself, imprint on us His likeness, forgive and free us.” (Ruysbroeck)
25. “The highest perfection in this life,” says a pious author, “consists in remaining so closely united to God that the soul with all its faculties and its powers is recollected in God,” “that its affections united in the joy of love find rest only in possession of the Creator. The image of God imprinted in the soul is formed by reason, memory, and will. As long as these faculties do not bear the perfect image of God, they do not resemble Him as on the day of creation.
The form of the soul is God who must imprint Himself there like the seal on wax, like the stamp on its object. Now this is not fully realized unless the intellect is completely enlightened by knowledge of God, the will captivated by love of the supreme good, and the memory fully absorbed in contemplation and enjoyment of eternal happiness.” “And as the glory of the blessed is nothing else than the perfect possession of this state, it is obvious that the initial possession of these blessings constitutes perfection in this life.” To “realize this ideal” we must “keep recollected within ourselves,” “remain silently in God’s presence,” “while the soul immerses itself, expands, becomes enkindled and melts in Him, with an unlimited fullness.
Image: Anonymous Russian icon painter ~ ’The Holy Trinity’; 15th century