The Prayer Journey of St John of the Cross

1 The Published Articles of Ernest E. Larkin, The Prayer Journey of St john of the Cross The Prayer Journey of St john of the Cross In one sense all john of the Cross ' real, because the whole person is caught up in teaching is on Prayer , since the goal of his an immense need that is frustrated. But the writing is divine union. But he has little on the condition is more than emotional infatuation. mechanics or even the phenomenology of the It is metaphysical in dimension and fully act of praying. He moves on the higher ground spiritual, embracing every fiber of the of principles, and these he discusses around bride's the three developmental phases of meditation, Healing will take place when the contemplation and union. crowning gift of union is received. Then the This paper is a schematic presentation transformation of the soul into God will be of these stages in dyadic form: viz. meditation- complete; the spouses will be totally alike in mortification, contemplation-poverty of spirit, perfect love and conformity of wills in a and union-in-symbols.

2 The stages will be union of likeness (A ; C ; ). discussed in the framework of the first 15 The divine presence will not only be restored stanzas of the poem, The Spiritual Canticle , but bridegroom and bride, Christ and the as interpreted by St john of the Cross in his person, will have a common life in commentary, , He assigns the first participant transformation (A ), with five stanzas to meditation-mortification, such a likeness that one can say that each is stanzas 6 to 12 (Canticle B) to the the other and both are one , (C ), all the contemplative way, and the rest of the poem to while retaining their own personal identities. union. The value of this study is to provide a road map of the sanjuanist Journey to divine Overview of the Process union. The transformation is the progressive The poem opens with immense pain of assimilation of the image of Christ, first in the loss: outside or normal functioning of the Where have You hidden, person's life, where God is apprehended in Beloved, and left me moaning?

3 Metaphor and analogy, and then in the inner depths where God communicates himself in The bridegroom (Christ) has contemplation. Faith creates a sketch like a disappeared and left the bride (the soul) with a wax impression or sketch of a painting which wound that only physical presence can heal. is completed and perfected through growth in The first two stages of the Journey have love (C ). This pattern is like an archetype brought on the condition, because they have which is progressively enfleshed by putting led the bride step by step into the void which off the false self with its illusions and desires john calls elsewhere the deep caverns of and putting on a Christ-centered life (Eph feeling ( Living Flame of Love , 3). It is an 4:22-24). john makes it clear that the intense experience of poverty of spirit that is completion of the project is possible only frightening in its depth. through contemplation (C ). Everything has been lost for the sake In the first stage of meditation and of the Beloved, and the prize of union has not mortification, a phase john passes over yet been given.

4 Instead there is a bone- quickly and by allusions without much shattering hollowness along with a feverish extended treatment, the divine individuation is yearning for God. The emotional element is done by bits and pieces. Engaging images of Page 270. The Published Articles of Ernest E. Larkin, The Prayer Journey of St john of the Cross Christ from the gospel replace the self- pursued with order and discretion (A. centered representations of ego and promote ). These desires are indeed inordinate, choices for God. The objective is to make precisely because they are not integrated into Christ more attractive and desirable than other the love of God (A ); they are thus desires. The images thus increase the love, and competitors. The mortification of all such it is love that fashions the likeness to Christ in desires or appetites is the trademark of St john the soul. of the Cross and often a threatening challenge The transactions take place on the for would-be disciples.

5 But for those who level of the sensible, which for john is meditate, it is a long-term objective; for the ordinary thinking and willing. It is the level, time being they engage in the limited of concrete images and the will-acts of mortification of struggling to be more faithful affective or effective love that flow from these to their vocation and the right use of perceptions; it is the active dark night, of the The project of total renunciation is senses. The passive night of the senses comes a reasonable objective when the soul is in the later and is the entrance into the spiritual way mode of of contemplation, which is the author's main In that second stage, contemplation is concern in all his works. john is the great the effective instrument of growth. The teacher of dark or apophatic contemplation, images which had served well in meditation which is pure gift and almost identified with are now broken open, and Christ is revealed in poverty of spirit.

6 It is no accident that the pure faith beyond the normal processes of keystone of the spiritual structure he builds in thought, in imageless and wordless Mystery. all his teaching is nakedness of spirit (A Sanjuanist contemplation is the same one prol,9; see, also the emphatic development of species of mystical grace which is defined as this theme, in F ), which is the nothing else than a secret and peaceful and outcome of the wholesale renunciation of all loving inflow of God, which, if not hampered, desires and the purification of the spirit fires the soul in a spirit of love (N ). It effected by the dark night of the same name. is divine wisdom, loving, tranquil, solitary This void and emptiness is a remote goal and peaceful, mild and it comes without beyond the scope of the stage of meditation- knowing from where nor how (F ; see mortification, where the concern is the also N ; A ). It is the source of the rectification and positive employment of paths and straits of love (C ).

7 Sensible activity for the honor and glory of Contemplation is the purifying fire of the God. The famous nadas, which are the passive dark nights of both sense and spirit, privation in will and affection of all sensible, and it comes from and leads to the pure faith, and spiritual satisfactions, become the direct hope and charity that are the life of the spirit. and proximate objective of spiritual striving at There is a proliferation of terms in john of the the end of the way of beginners, when Cross to describe this blessed state of contemplation is breaking into the person's contemplation-poverty of spirit, both in its life. This state is still the night of sense in positive context of the pure action of the john 's usage, but on the horizon of theological virtues and its negative condition contemplation. It has to do with our second of nakedness and emptiness of spirit, spiritual dyad rather than the first. poverty, selflessness, spiritual purity, The perspective is the biblical one of annihilation of the natural mode and a number absolute and single love of God (Mk 12:29; of other phrases (A ; A ; N ; F.))

8 See 10:18) against all other desires, but suited passim). The Journey here is to the strength of the person (A ) and immensely simple: it is toward an ever-deeper Page 271. The Published Articles of Ernest E. Larkin, The Prayer Journey of St john of the Cross affective detachment, which is at once the different moments in the process of condition for and the consequence of Christogenesis. sanjuanist contemplation. The inter-weaving of the different Contemplation and poverty of spirit experiences is illustrated in the fifteen verses move the relationship with God to the level of of the Canticle under examination. There is the whole person and beyond particular goods no question, about the advanced mystical state and choices (A ). The total person is of the bride, who is on the threshold of related to God in an authentic I-Thou, person- spiritual betrothal. But, to resolve the pain and to-person relationship. The patch-quilt of anxiety of separation from God she proposes a meditation and mortification has given way to vigorous asceticism (stanza 3) and a search in the seamless robe of contemplation.

9 Particular meditation for the Beloved (stanzas 4-5). representations of Christ that are the work of These are roads already taken and now the imagination have done their task, so that revisited. now the fostering of the image of Christ is on We shall address these beginnings first the level of spirit and the result of and then describe the way of contemplation contemplative love. and of divine union. Even in our attempt to The goal of the whole Journey , divine describe these passages there is an inevitable union, is described in the Canticle in the circularity, since the stages are best imagery of spiritual betrothal and marriage (C understood by comparison and contrast to ; F ). This final self- each other. john 's commentaries seem to communication of God makes the soul the follow this same method of exposition (A. perfect reflection of God, the mirror of the prol. 8). divine Beauty, Christ born anew and now fully formed in his spouse.

10 The bride is Meditation and Mortification transfigured; she has come home. Meditation is the activity of the religious imagination that fashions forms, Inter-relationship of the Stages figures and images and deploys them in These three stages are related to each discursive activity (A ). It is not a other, not in linear, but circular fashion. The method of Prayer as such, but a mode of searcher moves in concentric circles that spiral intentional activity describing the ordinary inward toward the center that is Christ. The thinking, feeling, deliberating, and choosing in movements are not perfect circles, but more active Prayer and behind the variety of often ellipses, which may Cross over from one activities that make up the Christian The stage to another. One's place in the Journey is dynamics of meditation operate in every effort determined by the predominance of a given to live out the gospel, such as Prayer , study, stage. Thus there are mixtures of experiences celebration of liturgy, work for justice, in a person's life, so that even experiences of community building and union are possible in a beginner, and mature Meditation involves images and mystics can meditate, not only in Prayer but in concepts, affections and will-acts and moves figuring things out making decisions and discursively among these elements.