NOTE ON THE CALL TO THE INFUSED CONTEMPLATION OF THE MYSTERIES OF FAITH

WE have pointed out above -- and we have developed the theme at length elsewhere [181] -- that the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost are connected with charity, [182] and that they consequently develop together with it. It is therefore impossible to have a high degree of charity without having at the same time and in a proportionate degree the gifts of understanding and wisdom, gifts which, together with faith, are the principle of the infused contemplation of revealed mysteries. In some of the saints, as in St. Augustine, this contemplation bears immediately upon the mysteries themselves; in others, as in a St. Vincent de Paul, it bears upon the practical consequences of these mysteries; for example, upon the life of the members of the mystical body of Christ. But in either case it is infused contemplation. The superhuman mode of the gifts, a mode of activity which is derived from the special inspiration of the Holy Ghost and which transcends the human mode of the virtues, [183] is at first latent, as in the ascetic life; but then it becomes manifest and frequent in the mystical life. In fact, the Holy Ghost usually inspires souls proportionately to their habitual docility or to their supernatural dispositions (i. e. according to the degree in which they possess the virtues and the gifts). This is definitely the traditional teaching.

We have also shown elsewhere, [184] that according to St. Thomas the gifts have not a human mode specifically distinct from their superhuman mode; for if this were so, the former might always be perfected without ever attaining to the latter, and would thus not be essentially subordinate to it.

Now, if the gifts have no human mode specifically distinct from their superhuman mode, it follows that -- as we have often said -- there is for all truly spiritual. souls a general remote call or vocation to the infused contemplation of the mysteries of faith -- a contemplation which alone can give a profound and living understanding of the redemptive Incarnation, of the indwelling of God within us, of the sacrifice of Calvary substantially perpetuated on the altar during the Mass, and of the mystery of the Cross which should be reproduced in any true and profound Christian life. However, this 'general and remote call' does not mean the same as an 'individual and proximate call,' just as a ' sufficient call' does not mean the same as an 'efficacious call.'

We have recently been conceded, on this matter, a point which we had not asked -- and which, incidentally, we do not accept -- namely, that

'the negative clement of perfection, that is to say, detachment from creatures, must be the same for all souls: complete, absolute, universal' ;

'there can be no degrees in the absence of voluntary faults. The very smallest, like the very greatest, destroys perfection... a thread is enough to hold a man captive.'

We do not think that detachment from creatures is the same for all, whether for the greatest saints or for those souls that have reached a minimal perfection. And the principal reason is, that perfection excludes not only faults that are directly voluntary, but also those that are indirectly voluntary; those which proceed from negligence and a relative tepidity, from a secret and semi- conscious egoism that does not allow the depth of the soul to belong completely to God. Likewise there is a certain co- relational between the intensive growth of charity and its extension, in consequence of which charity gradually excludes even those obstacles which we more or less unconsciously oppose to the work of grace in our souls.

If then, as we are granted, every soul is called by its progress in the love of God to exclude all voluntary faults, even the smallest, even those that are indirectly voluntary, it will succeed only by means of a high degree of charity. This charity will, evidently, be proportionate to the vocation of the individual soul; it will not be the same for Bernadette of Lourdes as it was for St. Paul; but it will have to be a high degree of charity. Without this the depth of the soul will not belong completely to God; without this there will still be some egoism, which will manifest itself often enough by faults that are at least indirectly voluntary.

If a soul is to be perfect, it must possess a degree of charity higher than that which it possessed when it was still in the ranks of beginners or of proficients; just as in the physical order the full age of manhood presupposes a physical strength superior to that of childhood or adolescence -- though it may be that accidentally a youth is found to be more vigorous than a fully grown man. [185]

What conclusion follows regarding the purgation of the depth of the soul, which is necessary to exclude all egoism and secret pride? A recent study on this question contains the following:

' I admit that the passive purgations (which are of the mystical order) are necessary in order to arrive at the purity required for mystical union; and it is in this sense that St. John of the Cross speaks.... But I deny that the passive purgations are necessary for the purity required in the union of love by conformity of wills. -- The reason of this difference is a profound one. For the mystical union, which involves infused contemplation and love, active purgation is not sufficient, precisely because the purity of the will is not sufficient. It is necessary that there should be added to it a sort of psychological purity of the substance and the powers of the soul, which consists in rendering them adapted to the mode of being of the divine infusion.'

The important question, then, is: Are the passive purgations, according to St. John of the Cross, not necessary for the profound purity of the will? Are they not necessary in order to exclude that more or less conscious egoism, and those indirectly voluntary faults which are incompatible with the full perfection of charity, incompatible also with the full perfection of the infused virtues and gifts, which develop together with charity like so many functions of the same spiritual organism?

The answer to this extremely important question, for our part, is not for a moment in doubt.

It suffices to read in the Dark Night [186] the description of those faults of beginners which render the purgation of the senses necessary. Here are, not faults opposed to the sort of psychological purity of which our author speaks, but faults which are contrary to the moral purity of the sensibility and of the will. They are, in fact, as St. John of the Cross tells us, the seven capital sins translated into the order of the spiritual life, such as spiritual greed, spiritual sloth, spiritual pride.

The same remark may be made of the faults [187] of proficients which render necessary the passive purgation of the spirit; they are

'stains of the old man which still remain in the spirit, like a rust which will disappear only under the action of an intense fire.'

These proficients, says St. John of the Cross, are really subject to natural affections; they have moments of roughness, of impatience; there is still in them a secret spiritual pride, and an egoism which causes some of them to make use of spiritual goods in a manner not sufficiently detached, and so they are led into the path of illusions. In a word, the depth of the soul is lacking, not only in psychological purity, but in the moral purity that is required. Tauler has spoken in the same sense, solicitous especially to purify the depth of the soul of all self-love, of all more or less conscious egoism. Hence it is our opinion that the passive purgations are necessary for this profound moral purity. But these purgations are of the mystical order. They do not always appear under so definitely contemplative a form as that described by St. John of the Cross; but in the lives of the saints, even of the most active among them, like a Vincent de Paul, the chapters which treat of their interior sufferings prove that they all have a common basis, which none has described better than St. John of the Cross.

A final and very important concession has been made to us in connection with the famous passage of the Living Flame, ST. II, 23:

' It behoves us to note why it is that there are so few that attain to this lofty stale. It must be known that this is not because God is pleased that there should be few raised to this high spiritual state-on the contrary it would please Him if all were so raised -- but rather because He finds few vessels in whom He can perform so high and lofty a work. For, when He proves them in small things and finds them weak and sees that they at once flee from labour, and desire not to submit to the least discomfort or mollification... He finds that they are not strong enough to bear the favour which He was granting them when He began to purge them, and goes no farther with their purification....'

With regard to this it has recently been conceded.

'We admit that St. John of the Cross is treating here of the spiritual marriage, and that he states that the will of God is that all souls should attain to this state. But we deny that this implies a universal call to the mystical life.... The confusion arises, in our opinion, from a failure to distinguish two elements included by St. John of the Cross in the two degrees of union called spiritual betrothal and marriage. One of these two elements is essential and permanent; the other accidental and transitory. The essential element is the union of wills between God and the soul, a union which results from the absence of voluntary faults and from the perfection of charity; the accidental element consists in the actual union of the powers, a mystical union in the proper sense of the word, a union which cannot be continuous.'

In this supposition, it is possible that the transforming union, or spiritual marriage, should exist in a person without that person ever having had a mystical union, the mystical union being merely an accidental element, like the interior words or the intellectual vision of the Blessed Trinity mentioned by St. Teresa. [188] To us, on the contrary, it appears certain that, according to St. John of the Cross, the transforming union cannot exist without there having been at least from time to time a very lofty contemplation of the divine perfections, an infused contemplation [189] proceeding from the gifts, which have now reached a degree proportionate to that of perfect charity. It is, he says,

'even as the fire that penetrates the log of wood... and having attacked and wounded it with its flame, prepares it to such a degree that it can enter it and transform it into itself.' [190]

Moreover, to our mind it is absolutely certain-that the profound union of wills between God and the soul, which is recognized as being the essential element of the transforming union, presupposes the moral purgation of the depth of the soul, a purgation from that more or less conscious self-love or egoism which is the source at least of many indirectly voluntary faults; and this moral purification of the depth of the soul, according to St. John of the Cross, requires the passive purgations which eliminate the faults of beginners and proficients.

We therefore maintain what we have said, in common with numerous theologians, Dominican and Carmelite, about the doctrine of St. Thomas and St. John of the Cross concerning the gifts of the Holy Ghost. To conclude, we recall especially these two important texts:

' The night of sense is common and comes to many; these are the beginners.' [191]

Being passive, this purification, or night, is of the mystical order.

'The way of progressives or proficients... is called the way of illumination or of infused contemplation, wherewith God Himself feeds and refreshes the soul.' [192]

Hence infused contemplation is in the normal way of sanctity, even before the unitive way is reached; and therefore it is inconceivable that a soul should be in the state of spiritual marriage or the transforming union without ever having had that infused contemplation of the mysteries of faith which is the eminent exercise of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, developing in us side by side with charity.

We cannot admit that a mind of the calibre of St. John of the Cross can have meant only something accidental when he wrote the passage which we have just quoted, and which we quote once more in conclusion:

'The way of progressives or of proficients... is called the way of illumination or of infused contemplation, wherewith God Himself feeds and refreshes the soul.'