“The Church, in her fidelity, values all things according to the preferences of her divine Spouse. Now, our Lord esteems His elect not so much by the activity of their works, as by the hidden perfection of their lives; that perfection which is measured by the intensity of the divine life, and of which it is said: ‘Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect.’ Again it is said of this divine life: ‘You are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God.’”

The good always seeks to spread.

In fact, the more perfect a being, the more good they radiate around themselves. Everything that is full of life, joy, love, seeks to spread love, joy and life. This is true for all things and in all areas of one’s life. Take the example of a flower which is perfection within a plant; it spreads the radiance of its colour, its fragrance and its seeds. A bird which is happy to live freely, rejoices the whole countryside with its melodious song.

Its the same for man. When a person has found something that they are happy with, they want to share it with everyone, a magnificent landscape, an inspiring book, just to give an example. All life, all joy, all love, wants to spread even if just a little. Because what we liked, what exhilarated us, that should and ought to also please our fellow men and exhilarate them in turn. 

It is therefore a consequence of human solidarity if we are full of ourselves and therefore full of bitterness and envy, we will only pass on to others what we have. However, if we are filled with the peace and gentleness of Our Lord, we will overflow with that peace and gentleness which enables us to console others. 

We are able to distinguish two kinds of joy and love: expressed and unexpressed joy, manifested and hidden love, in short, the active outer life and the contemplative inner life. 

In the active exterior life, you know that you are able to communicate your beliefs and feelings, and how you achieve it. If truth be told, this is a gift that not everyone has in their possession; it depends a lot on one’s physical make-up. Those who have a beautiful voice, a profound air, gracious manners, and whatever else there may be? They know how to impose themselves upon others and transmit their ideas or their desire. They are the great orators, they are great teachers of men; some among them, are saints, other politicians, or even men who, without being on a public platform, succeed within society in uniting enthusiasm and empathy for them. 

Yet, it is quite another thing to have a heart filled to brim with love and a radiating mind or to have a gift in gratifying and persuading others. These are two quite distinct genres. 

You could, for example, be aflame with the love of God and have compassion for the poor, but be witless or blind and not have two pennies to rub together; in this case, no one would ever suspect what is within your heart. 

I read somewhere the story of a child who cried when he was happy and laughed when he was sad: it was impossible for him to communicate his joy and his sadness, but he still had inner joys and sorrows.

So we have to conclude this: a good word, a smile, these are really good entities and they spread a little consolation around them, just like a flower or a bird of spring. But this radiance of our words, of our actions, is not yet the radiance of our ideas or our feelings. 

Our ideas and our feelings, all that we have in the heart of light and love, these are realities which are no longer physical, material, but moral, spiritual, invisible, that is to say therefore, that they must also have a spiritual, invisible radiance. 

To better understand how necessary this is, let us for example compare, a good thought toward a star.

As God lights a star in the night sky, He instills within our minds an act of trust in Him and a desire to comfort all the poor suffering hearts upon the earth. What was most valuable and most important? The star, or the act of faith and charity? It is obvious that what is within our soul is far more important than the whole the celestial sphere; a scientist pointed out that if a man is materially very small in the presence of the stars, he is infinitely greater than all of them through his spirit since he can know them and know that God has created them, whilst the stars don’t know anything about God or creation.

So a good thought is infinitely greater in value than a star! A heart full of love is a home hotter than the sun! Could you ever believe that God would allow this absurdity, of a star to radiate its light which radiates billions of miles away and for millions of years, to make known the ardour of this distant entity, of this spinning globe of matter? in the frozen vastness of space, and that a soul united to God is deprived of its radiance or that its radiance depends on some type of unfortunate physical conditions: a voice more or less clamorous, a more or less intelligent air, a more or less considerable force? No! A hundred times no! 

The Church that is right when she teaches us the extraordinary and important dogma of the Communio Sanctorum — Communion of Saints — the fellowship of those united to Jesus Christ in Baptism. All of our good thoughts and our good sentiments, our acts of Faith and Love which are just like spiritual stars; they radiate both faith and love ad infinitum. They are centres of consolation, and of strength; souls which are united to God forming an immense constellation which dazzles the eyes of angels and which must never be extinguished in the heavens of Holy Mother Church. 

The apostolate of the contemplatives, a silent and invisible apostolate, rests entirely upon this affirmation: love is something tangible, concrete, and even what is most real in the world, and the world can only be saved through acts of Faith and Charity. 

This is what God is asking of man, it is what repairs the evil caused by sin, it is what consoles and strengthens those who are suffering, not through good words, or money, not even (outward) examples of virtue, it is Faith and Charity, which give life to these words, to these alms, to these examples.

But Faith and Charity still have a far more extensive action than the external works which they have to animate.

Indeed, a heart united to Our Lord, an immolated soul cooperates in the redemptive action of Our Lord which in turn radiates love within hearts, in union with the hearth of divine Charity.

Outer works reach only the exterior part of men; inner acts of charity impart life and consolation to countless souls within hearts.

The material alms are extremely limited, but the alms of contemplatives are an inexhaustible source within both time and space. 

If the role of contemplatives is so little understood and so difficult to support, it is because, here, everything happens in the invisible; it is absolutely necessary to live in the night of supernatural Faith. But what makes this life so difficult is also what makes it worth. A man’s life is substantial and beautiful insofar as it is animated by Faith. Those who only believe in what they see are cowards who achieve nothing at all and will meet their death in a pensioner’s reclining chair, or behind a grocery counter without ever having made a fortune, because it takes a certain kind of daring and fearlessness to make a fortune! It is through a leap of faith that all great businesses become possible. Imagine what kind of a leap of faith it took for Christopher Columbus to be the first to set off on an uncharted and perilous ocean and discover the Americas! Well, to be a cloistered religious, to be contemplative, one has to have significantly greater faith. We must set off just as Saint Peter did, walk upon the sea which at any moment seems intent on swallowing us up. You have to (as the Little Flower Thérèse of the Child Jesus reminds us) go through extremely dark tunnels, so dark that you begin to wonder if the sun still prevails. You have to take a chance and risk your life, you have to throw yourself eyes closed into the arms of the Good Lord who is waiting for us within this darkness. This is the price of the heroism of the saints! Entering the unknown, taking a chance and without a second though, make the jump based on good faith. Its a risk that many would not take.

But what these heroes — whom are bolder than all of the navigating and explorers in history—, are discovering is not the New World, the continent of America, it is not even El Dorado or the Seven Cities of Gold —a new earthly paradise— it is, right here below, on earth, the true Kingdom of Heaven, promised by the Son of God.

It is for those who live like this in Faith that Our Lord said: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe” (John 20:29) and here I would like to remind you all that Faith in Our Lord is not blind faith. The Bible does not tell us to exercise “blind faith,” but a faith which is firmly embedded in objective reality.

Prayer to Saint Bruno

O God, merciful Father, who called Saint Bruno to the solitude of the desert to found the Order of the Carthusian monastery; We ask you to free us from the sorrows of this world through his intercession and to grant us the gift of peace and spiritual joy that you have promised to those who persevere in seeking you.

Amen

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