Advice from St. Mary Magdalene d'Pazzi

The hermit would do well to think on this advice from St. Mary Magdalene d'Pazzi, mystic and victim soul, Carmelite nun of the 16th century, Florence, Italy. What is written of the saint's words regarding the ideal of a Carmelite nun, is appropriate for the hermit.

"Dead to themselves in all things and in every way, they ought to live only in God and for God....They will then do nothing, see nothing, hear nothing but God, and will become, so to speak, another God by participation and union. Therefore, if they work, it is not they who work, but it is God Who is working in them. If they speak, it is God Who speaks in them. And so on in all things.

"Have no care but God. Want Him alone with your will; seek His pure glory and honor in your every action, even the least."

St. Mary Magdalene further distinguishes between nuns of active life and nuns of contemplative life, and the hermit falls in the latter category.

"Those who are apostles--for instance, nuns of active life--have many ways of glorifying God and making themselves helpful to their neighbor: They have children to teach, the sick to care for, souls to comfort and to convert. But for the Carmelite all these things are forbideen by her very vocation. She has only the interior means: death to herself, so that God may live and work in her.

"Apostles have their preoccupations and distractions, but also their consolations. They see from time to time the fruit of their labors and they have the satisfaction of movement, of employing for God the talents they have received. But for the Carmelite the contrary is the rule; nothing interrupts her routine, the days follow one another, all alike...and so too the years, for her entire life. She can but gaze unswervingly at the goal to be attained, and repeat with Christ: 'Father, for them do I sanctify myself' (John 17:19)."

And this:

"God asks of us a true death, without which we shall never be able to do anything. But do not think that you can gain this death to self with milk and honey in your mouth, with internal and external sweetness. It is impossible for one truly to die without feeling pain."

The encouragement to such a death, to the highest degree of perfection, the saint speaks thus:

"It is here that we should earnestly desire to arrive, in order to be of help to our neighbor and to give great satisfaction to God and joy to all of paradise. The prayers of these souls are always heard, because of the intimate union they have with God. And just as the Eternal Father denies nothing to His Son, Who is in all things like Himself, so these souls, inasmuch as they have become one with God, obtain all that they ask."

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The hermit reads and tries to assimilate this message from St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi. It is not easy. The reality is so painful a death, and the death continues in the sense of being suffocated, of shut down, of buried alive, of not given a chance, of not being utilized in the Church, of being etherized and sent out into the galaxy.

The spiritual da called last evening, and he thought the phrase and the word "ether" to be very good, a very good word, and appropriate. The hermit told him it was a vapor from the upper realms and the root means "to burn, to shine."

He said, "Don't burn out! You are a good Catholic! Don't burn out! Only shine!"

The hermit feels as if burning out, or already burned out. There are brief spurts of shine, but the burned out blackness is particularly intense before and after Masses. This is not good, not good at all. The hermit feels much guilt for this blackened burn-out, and does not feel at all like a good Catholic.

But once back at Agnus Dei, and looking out upon the waters of Lake Immaculata, and soon to begin some editing work unrelated except to the commercial world of people ripped off unjustly, the hermit will manage through another few hours. The burned-out blackness is offered to God for souls, for the Church.