Presence of God

Grant, O Lord, that I may shed only such tears as are pleasing to You and that will help me to grow in Your love.

Meditation

I. The Beatitude : "Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted" (Mt. 5, 5), corresponds to the gift of knowledge. Blessed are they who, thoroughly enlightened by the Holy Spirit as to the nothingness of creatures, weep for the time they have spent seeking them, and mourn over the energy and affection they have wasted on the vanities of the world. These are the burning tears of St. Augustine who, in his Confessions, continually laments : "Late have I loved Thee, O Beauty ever ancient, ever new, late have I loved Thee.... Thou wert with me, but I was not with Thee; creatures kept me far from Thee." These are the tears ofthe penitent Magdalen, and of St. Peter weeping over his fall; blessed tears, cleansing souls from sin and disposing them for friendship with God. These are the tears ofsouls determined to seek God in preference to all creatures, but who still, because of their frailty, have to reproach themselves daily for some weakness, some slight return to futile earthly satisfactions. The gift of knowledge does not permit us to close our eyes to our infidelities, however slight, but it makes us hate them and weep for them with tears of compunction. One who lives under the influence of this gift will never be careless or superficial in his examinations of conscience; his confessions, though peaceful, will always be sorrowful and accompanied by true contrition. Such were the confessions of the saints, who with the most lively sorrow accused themselves oftheir slightest imperfections.

The Holy Spirit does not want us to be scrupulous, but He does want us to be very delicate in our fidelity to God. He is not satisfied that we despise the vanities of the world in general, but He wants us to despise them in their most subtle manifestations, such as slight retaliations of self-love, little self-complacencies, or concern for the affection and esteem of others. Blessed the soul who knows how to recognize all its miseries and weep for them, not with tears of discouragement or anxiety, but with tears of profound sorrow, which instead of contracting its heart in fear, will dilate it in repentant love, and cast it into God’s arms, with a heart renewed by love and sorrow.

II. The gift of knowledge, making us clearly realize the vanity of creatures, convinces us that they are perishable and full of defects; hence, it incites us to place all our hope in God. In this sense, the gift of knowledge perfects and strengthens the virtue of hope so that, without further hesitation, our heart anchors itself in God, recognizing in Him our only strength and support, our only happiness.

The more we hope in God and the beatific possession of Him which awaits us in eternal life, so much the more are we disposed, not only to renounce the happiness and satisfaction which creatures can offer us, but also to embrace all the sacrifices necessary to reach eternal life. Many sacrifices are necessary because we cannot go to God except by following the path traced by the Son of God to lead us to Him : the way of the Cross. But even though it suffers, the soul who lives by hope can repeat the words of St. Paul: "We faint not...for that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, worketh for us above measure exceedingly an eternal weight of glory" (2 Cor 4, 16.17). The gift of knowledge helps us judge our present sorrows as light when compared with eternal beatitude, in view of which it incites us to bless them, even should they cost us our blood. This is why the Apostle rejoiced and gloried in his tribulations (cf. Rom 5,3), and St. Francis of Assisi sang, "The joys I hope for are so great that all pain is dear to me."

Under the influence of the gift of knowledge, the soul understands the blessedness of tears, that is, the blessedness ofsuffering embraced for the love of God. This gift does not make us insensible to physical and moral pain; so true is this that the beatitude speaks expressly of "tears," but although it does not keep us from weeping, it does sanctify our weeping and makes us more resigned to God’s will, preferring these tears to the vain joys of the world and regarding them as a means of becoming more like unto Christ crucified. What a difference between such tears and those shed through pride, because we will not submit to God’s will, or because ofthe capricious resentments ofself-love.

When a soul has reached the point where it prefers blessed tears shed at the foot of the Cross to the joys of earth, it can hope in the beatitude promised by Jesus : "Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted."

Colloquy

"O Lord, the peace You give us in this world is full of anxieties, tribulations, and persecutions; but then You bring us to a quiet, tranquil peace. I can even say that in the midst of these difficulties You give us Your peace, because the Spirit attests in this way that we are Your children. This means, ‘ Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. ’ Not only will You comfort us in the future, but You turn our very tears into consolation, and war itself into peace. He who loves You, O Lord, finds in the most burning fire of tribulation the cool breeze and the dew of heavenly consolation" (St. Mary Magdalen dei Pazzi).

"Blessed are You, O my God, because You have not demanded from us as the price of Your kingdom, a long period of suffering, but a very brief one, as brief as life, a moment compared with an eternity of happiness! Truly, iffor love ofYou, we had to endure for hundreds ofthousands ofyears, sufferings a thousand times harder, more painful and severe, we should have accepted Your decree with immense joy and longing, and thanked You on our knees with our hands joined. How much more then, should we thank You now that, in Your mercy, You have deigned to give us the shortest time possible of suffering, a time as short as life! Short as an instant, as nothing, because life is nothing compared with eternity.

"Come then, come, O children of God; let us hasten to the Cross of Christ, to sorrow, contempt, and poverty! Grant, O Lord, that I may love You as You have loved me, with that absolute fidelity, purity, and love which reserves nothing for self, which gives itself wholly and therefore runs to pain and suffering, seeing and feeling in all things nothing but love" (St. Angela of Foligno).