For my purposes here on this blog, perhaps the key chapter
is “Providence
Some of the questions asked by readers over the years are
answered by Garrigou-Lagrange profoundly through his use of St. Catherine’s Dialogue. My latest copy is in England in storage (sigh) and my original copy
is in storage in Illinois
The first question answered by the two Dominicans is phrased
by Garrigou-Lagrange like this. “In what Christian perfection especially
consists”.
Catherine quotes Aquinas: it is not in acts of piety or in
mortifications that perfection principally consists, but in charity-the love of
God and the love of neighbor.
Many prayers and many acts of devotion pale in comparison
with death of self-will, the great act of love we can give to God. Acts of
piety and mortifications are means, not the end, points out Christ in the Dialogue. These means are, most likely,
necessary for the death of self, but the goal is complete dependence and trust
in God. Again, love is the answer. Love forms the basis for all actions, all
prayers, which Christ states are external works, not internal change. These
external works are finite, not infinite. Christ refers to these in the Dialogue as material, not spiritual
realities.
Christ tells Catherine, “Merit
consists in the virtue of love alone, directed by the light of true discretion,
without which the soul is worth nothing. Discretion gives me this love
endlessly, boundlessly, since I am the supreme and eternal truth. The soul can
therefore place neither laws nor limits to her love for me; but her love for
her neighbor, on the contrary, is ordered in certain conditions.”
So, we cannot sin for the good of another, or we cannot act
against prudence. However, as Christ did and as Christ tells Catherine, we can
lay down our lives for our friends.
“This, then,”
Garrigou-Lagrange writes, “is what
Christian perfection consists in especially, principally in a generous love of
God, and secondarily in love for our neighbor, which is no just affection, but
translates itself into action.”
Catherine writes, as Garrigou-Lagrange reminds us, that love
is the basis of all the virtues. Love is the mother of all virtues. Love is the
“bridal garment of God’s servants” writes Catherine. We love for the sake of God, not for the sake
of the person. Many do not understand this, but those who have been married for
a long time and come to love the other in the will, not merely in the emotions,
have found this love.
So do those in the monastery who do not lose their first
love find this love again and again, through obedience, through devotion,
through loving the others in their convents, in their abbeys.
Those who are single must seek out ways to love in this
detached manner, if God does not give them aged parents for whom to care, or
siblings to whom to reach out.
Catherine states that the fountain of God’s love gives life
to friendships. Yes, this is true. We love God more than all others, and more
than ourselves, therefore, we can love others.
This ends the answer to the first question.
To be continued…