Catholic Christian Mystic Hermit: Partial Correspondence to Professor Friend

(Part of correspondence to a dear friend, a professor I had in a course on John of the Cross in Catholic University of Avlia, Spain.  She has lost her husband in this past year plus has some type of malady which has limited her.  God bless her beautiful and loving soul!)

I notice the ones I greatly admire--mostly of the distant past--who were mistreated but moved on through the human-made elements and laws of the temporal church, even such as John of the Cross who was "in" a religious order but not really "with" it in his mind, heart, and soul but rather was IN HIS REAL PRESENCE all the time, elevated and had "passed through" the temporal church like the passageway it is--a passageway in which to learn and read and experience and grasp the differences between the temporal church with it's contrivances and personalities, those who are into organization and prestige, power, position and possession of many temporal aspects--and that of the Church that Christ instituted and invisioned, that He taught of what is best and right because he spoke against so many aspects of the Jewish "church" of His life on earth, the hypocrisies and twisted traditions, the extremism of human-created and altered laws, of the ills of the high priests and scribes, the Pharisees and Sadducees, and of the who-who types of people attending, and then of the blind sheep without a Shepherd, as it were.

People such as John of the Cross, Bruno the Carthusian, the desert fathers and mothers of early first centuries, Bernard of Clairvaux--these are some of the Christians who seemed to grasp the temporal Church as a passageway rather than a be-all and end-all but a means of developing and learning to discern what is of the Trinity and the useful aspects and knowledge learned, the theology, the Living word especially, the Law of God (Law of Love), the actual and very real presence of the Three Persons of the Trinity indwelling in us and us in His Real Presence.  They came to grasp and live and strive IN the Trinity, and their writings demonstrate they had passed through the temporal Church even if such as Bernard existed as spiritual leader in a group of men desiring God also, as did Bruno, even though /bruno did not at all want a religious order of his way of having passed through; after his /death Guigo 1 did that.  Same with Francis--had passed through the temporal church and wanted nothing to do with a religious order or list of goals despite giving in at the end of his short life, and wrote a few "rules" which were against his will, and for his plight, the Lord gave him the stigmata due to Francis desiring union IN His REal Presence and not a temporal organization of his way of coming to God, to the spiritual and mystical realities, to Love of God.

So these people like the early desert fathers and mothers and some others who have written of their passages and transitions through the temporal Church as passageway and of coming to the /stairway to Heaven while on earth, and living beyond the temporal, having passed through that and of not succumbing to the temporal church tainted with humankind's touch and twisting of what Christ taught and God desires.  His law is simple yet profound and most difficult:  the Law of Love of God and of others as God Loves.

So I am trying to accept that I passed through part-way through 2008, and prior to that was tempted and fell to being tempted to be drawn off in the twistings in and of the temporal church, of all that humankind had devised and created and developed and organized way beyond and full of distractions, and the pitfalls of power, prestige, position, possessions of church religious as well as parishioners: snares of the shallow end rather than going on out, passing through, into the depths of God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit--the Trinity, His Real Presence.  And of residing there, through, with, and IN HIM.  Of learning to love, of loving to learn to love, and of living God's Law of Love.

So I'm trying to accept the years I hung on to what is not, and instead am trying to seek nakedly and in simplicity of trust, hope, love--what IS.

To ask God's forgiveness for having tarried in what is not, and to also forgive myself for having done so, to have clung to what is not despite so many messages, dreams, visions, locutions of moving on through, of being shown it as passageway filled with what is very good and helpful to learn, and to then pass on to the base of the stairway to heaven and begin ascending.  Yet I have dog-paddled at the base of the Stairway, keeping me feet on the bottom step and grasping the newel post, unsure and doubting perhaps, or fearful mostly that what God was telling me and showing me somehow was incorrect and tempted to still think of the temporal church with all its humankind-created this and that to be not a passageway and that I had passed through long since, even at times pushed on and out literally!

Somehow I felt a great need of a puppy that will grow into a small dog, as a living thing that will be happy to see me each morning and will not criticize but rather will have much acceptance of me who is different and with pain lives a solitary life.  The first month was difficult, as the pup named Mercy is a daily life changer; I have had to die more to myself in ways I thought perhaps I had but had not.  I must let go of my wanting to stay in bed as much and get up to let the pup out, to feed and train, to take her for a walk, to learn to play with her a bit, to also learn to love this little creature and practice virtues such as patience and temperance, self-control and fidelity to a dependent and rather helpless but quite happy and devoted dog.

I thought I was digressing spiritually, but I am finding out that I still had much to learn in these various ways, including discipline to keep going, to simply keep going, and that I am acceptable at least to the dog, even if I fall short.  I suppose the dog is a gift from God of sorts, to remind me of how God is loving, accepting of me, faithful, and wants me to keep going, to get up, to play a bit, to take a walk, to notice how Mercy the pup likes to sit out on the grass and just watch the scenery, the geese when they fly, the grass, the common area pond of the subdivision, and how she delights in people especially, when we go on an errand or walk, and how she also loves other dogs when we encounter them--but some of the dogs growl or are not interested in her.  

It is good for me to see how Mercy (the pup, now three months old) moves on after some initial wishing and wondering--a second or two--and then is happily walking or finding something else of interest and delight.  That is how to treat those in situations or encounters who do not like or want contact with us; there is always something greater that stirs us onward and forward:  His Real Presence as the All in our lives and the lives of all creatures and creation.

It seems pathetic that I'd need a dog to help remind me and to make me get up in the morning.  Plus, the pain is up as a result of walking (impact of concrete but good exercise and to get out), to be out of bed, and the humility of needing more pain medication in order to manage my emotions and temper, my impatience, my remembrance to praise God always and be joyful as He is Joy and Light.

I know Michael is doing great, and we are the ones struggling and remain in this temporal life which itself is a passageway.  I know Alexandra is being guided and assisted by His Real Presence and her angel in her care of Larry and all aspects of household and the temporal responsibilities we have in this world, of our domiciles and citizenry, of the temporal costs and laws and taxes.  Larry is suffering so, and I continue to pray for him, also, and Judy Wood whose cancer is evidently no longer in remission.  I pray for you, and I hope that Juliana is there with you or you are able to visit and stay with Juliana for a while if you wish and it is helpful.  Of course, going to Avila is a long trip.

A long time acquaintance and clinical psychologist suggested to me that regarding my adult children and grandchildren that I be receptive rather than reach in, for when I'd reach in and not have responses, it was rejection repeatedly.  It is not easy as we want to reach in even to let others kjnow we are thinking of them, love them, hoping they are doing all right, encouraging and supporting them.  But I am accepting that my children have their own busy lives, and that their remembrance of childhood and teen years and following with a mother erratic with pain, are not pleasant memories now that they have their own lives unencumbered by the heaviness of the pain they lived with day in and out which at the time cast a depressive pall and then when I'd be not as pained, a kind of manic upswing of hopefulness and joy as the pain sieges would ease off, but then come again.  

My life has been so abnormal, and even to see me not so accepted by priests and parishioners, and not understand church as passageway--that also then points to me as failed, I suppose, in their view of matters.  And I had felt that, also; but now I am contemplating simply accepting that I tarried too long in the passageway and too caught up in the temporal church rather than in noticing how the ones I so admire even in their writings and lives biographied--passed through despite still being "a Catholic."  That label was nothing overt in their lives; they had arrived at the base of the stairway to heaven while on earth, and while on earth they began climbing step by step as they had passed through the temporal church, learning what was needed, and taking with them the crux of the learning as they started to ascend the stairs, climb the holy mountain, IN HIS REAL PRESENCE and on earth, yes, but not focused on the temporal of the Church, a passageway, passed through.

Bruno more outwardly had "had it" in Cologne with an envious bishop causing his life stress and hindering him.  /when the time was ripe, he left for the farthest reaches of the Alps, passing through a Benedictine monastery en route and wintering over, but realizing that, too, was too weighted by temporal and was that which to pass through, as well, on his quest for His Real Presence in an environment unencumbered by what is not Christ's instituting nor plan for His Body, not ultimately, but merely was, is, a passageway.

Catholic Hermit: Deeper Conversions

Of course, this extended period of physical suffering includes--and perhaps has predominant impetus in--deeper spiritual conversions.

These periods of immense suffering include the accompanying storms and darkness.  The body, mind, heart, and soul are put through the grinder, so to speak.  Or, to stick with weather metaphor--all aspects of body, mind, heart, and soul are buffeted by howling winds, pounded by torrential rains, drought-ridden by desert dryness, immobilized and frozen in icy avalanches.

This period of time here, for my body, mind, heart, and soul--seems as if not weathering this storm.  Yet, it most certainly must be or I'd not be writing about it.

Last evening, when realizing I have no means to do manual labor, and at a deeper sense no work to be done in any active or acceptable, tangible, capacity in the temporal Catholic Church--and facing the unknowing of when or if the body would be "doing" much again, at all--an email came.  It is one that I have received the past three years, asking for some St. Bernard Love of God Bourbon Balls.

I realized the Lord was reaching in, saying, "You can do this.  I will let you be able to make these over which you pray and pour love into the efforts."  

Making these small and simple confections are usually without obstacles--nothing like other work efforts or interactions with the temporal world that become marathons of perseverance and endurance.  Other than if the printer is ornery if more labels are needed, the process is something that my body can manage if I make them in phases.  It is so very painful for me to stand in one spot for more than five minutes or even less.  And that is the case even when the back pain is at more manageable levels.

There is nothing else in my life right now that I can actually "do" and have satisfactory completion.  I am still persevering with kitchen and bathroom cabinets, so those rooms cannot be finished until there is resolution with the store and cabinet company representative.  There is nothing else--no other area of life that can be engaged to complete something.

Even all the garden harvest that I processed and froze is ruined.  Somehow, the cord came loose from the outlet when a couple weeks ago--surely must have been then--I struggled with each awkward and heavy bathroom base cabinet, having to get them in from the pole barn to the house.  Yesterday, when I finally was able to walk the short distance to the pole barn, needing a container of frozen food, I discovered all in the freezers had long-since thawed.  There is no meat involved, but the hermit's winter and spring food supply is all but gone.

Can't even empty it out--body not able.

As for what is going on spiritually in this deeper conversion, I've written it to Fr. V. in Nigeria and to a long-time friend, not Catholic, but who reads without comment, and prays.  Fr. V. is unlikely to respond with comment other than to remind to pray and remain in Christ's love.  Yet, it serves a purpose to express the depths of thoughts, insights, and conclusions when the storms are ravaging the outer and inner earth of our beings.

I am considering on a deeper level such great and successfully spiritual souls as Bruno the Carthusian, John of the Cross, and Joseph Benedict LeBre.  Their times of deeper conversions give great insight into those called to a different type of temporal life, a deeper call to live in the spiritual realm while their bodies existed in the temporal world.  Even with John of the Cross, his mind, heart, and soul went to another "place" although living amidst his fellow Carmelite religious brothers.  

He wrote his great insights and poetry more toward the beginning of his adult life as a consecrated religious and priest.  In the very few years between his imprisonment and torture by his fellow priests and monks and his final years of persecution again by his fellow religious, John had brief cohesion of active life utilization of his body, mind, heart, and spirit as spiritual director to Teresa of Avila's religious sisters in the several foundations she made of reformed Carmelites.

Bruno had more temporal Catholic world utilization at the beginning of his priesthood but extending some years when he was priest and professor in Cologne, Germany.  His departure from the temporal Catholic world was a decisive separation although previously had been an agreed-upon goal between himself and five or six friends--some of them priests.  They had resolved to leave that world and seek union in God without the temporal distractions and the laws of minds that can cause all kinds of obstacles to the "climb up the holy mountain.".  

And leave they did, and up the highest mountain they could find in the farthest reaches of the French Alps. Bruno was only called back to the temporal Catholic world once after that, by a pope.  He assisted for a short time although the pope wanted him to remain longer in his service.  But Bruno left for another foundation of similarly-minded men (again, some of them priests and others not) that later became also a monastery known as part of the Carthusian order.  Bruno died there.  

He did not formally "found" the order himself.  No, he simply (but I am sure with many dyings to self along the way) lived the ideals and in the way he thought was most helpful in climbing the holy mountain, to live spiritually the Christian ideal for achieving Divine Union and living the law of God.  He did not write down any laws of mind; he lived in whatever way he sensed could be successful in the repeated deeper conversions which would reach the spiritual summit.

Joseph Benedict LeBre sought entrance to numerous religious orders.  He was allowed entrance into several, often with much reservation on the parts of abbots and priors.  He never lasted long; they were concerned about what they perceived as his potential to be ill, and a couple superiors sent him on his way due to his becoming ill.  In other monastic attempts, he was considered to be at cross-ends with the goals and efforts of the monks themselves. Joseph's focused and desirous seeking of the spiritual realm and of God did not fit in.  Out he went.

Joseph had his mind, heart, and soul set on the spiritual heights.  Yes, he was crushed repeatedly when sent away from the various religious houses.  But that led him to a time of deeper conversion in which he realized he was called to live the life of a "pilgrim."  He determined to follow Jesus directly, without the ways and means or laws of minds involved in religious orders or other designated vocations.  He wandered for a couple of years or so in France before sensing within a strong calling to walk to Rome.  

Joseph LeBre wandered, walked, lived, and prayed as Jesus did in His life ministry.  He never encountered his family again.  Even in Rome, he lived as a pilgrim--not taking upon himself label of hermit or religious solitary or anything other vocational title.  Today he would be likened to a hobo or a homeless person; in Rome, those who noticed him at first considered him a filthy vagrant.  He died in the odor of sanctity, on a street, although a priest convinced him to live in his rectory for awhile, living there along with a few other homeless men the priest took in--worn out and ill from their ages, poverty, and harsh living conditions.

These three examples, have roosted in my mind this past day, as they have off and on for several years.  As such, these three souls (on earth known as saintly men) assist me in the deeper conversion occurring.  Such conversions are unlikely to provide much progress or success if the body is not incapacitated from all activity and distractions.  Thus, while difficult to be rid of current temporal distractions due to the pain and the mind's concerns about how will the work progress in this hermitage, how will I be able to do the heavier work once the family leaves the area--a prolonged, incapacitating pain siege allows for that self-concern mindset to pass.

Then the eye of the storm occurs in which the temporal worries and questions and thoughts of even past persecutions or whatever else, are stilled and silenced.  That is when His Real Presence shines the light on the deeper conversion and upon the decisions and acceptances that are to be made if one is willing.  If not, there will be yet more storms and then eyes of the storms with their opportunities for deeper conversions.

The three men have been in the beam of Christ's light in this day of the eye of this storm.  Even though the body could get up and move about a bit more, the pain is enough to remand: lay low, be still.  And, there is now the recognition of the storm's purpose, the pain siege's "inner eye."  The mind and heart want to pursue the deepening and to be given, in the soul's "eye," the insights and courage required to venture forth and through the other side of this storm.

These three men's life examples of following Jesus in His life and teachings and in the law of God, are with me as companions--as storm chasers, I guess we could say.  We don't need to fall victim to storms but rather to see them as they are--natural events brought and allowed by God--and to enter into them knowing that in the storm's eye are the deeper conversions of greater Christ-clarity, of spiritual progression, and hold the graces we carry with us when we pass through them.

God bless His Real Presence in us!  Little children, let us love God above all things and love one another as ourselves!