Our way of understanding the Gospel as the illustration of our spiritual journey of growth, of understanding Christ as our way, can lead us to think that the journey of following in the footsteps of Christ, ends at the conclusion of the Gospel. A conclusion where we are called to the heroism of martyrdom, to carry our Cross and follow Christ to the end and to die like Him for our brothers! The fact is that we do not conceive of a life on earth after this imitation of Christ’s death. This means that implicitly, when in Spiritual Theology we try to understand the shape of the spiritual journey, we place “Union with God” at the journey’s end. Sometimes even in our imagination, we see it as happening “a few minutes”, so to speak, before our death. Often, consequently, we defer Union to a work of purification after death: Purgatory.
In this process of understanding the shape of our journey – a process both important and carried out implicitly (unconsciously) – as we look at the course of the Lord’s life, we apply Christ’s journey as described in the Gospels to ourselves! We do not necessarily think for a second about the fact that the apostles, those who recount Christ’s life to us in the Gospel, did not actually die with Christ’s death. The thought of what became of them never crosses our minds. It has to be said, however, that all this happens implicitly. All the major manuals of Spiritual Theology from the first half of the last century onwards instinctively followed this schema (Poulain, Tanquerey, Arintero, de Guibert, Garrigou-Lagrange, Marie-Eugène, etc.). And for nineteen centuries this is how Christian life was understood: as an ascent into Heaven, an ascent to the summit of the mountain, i.e. as an ascent towards Union, with this being the final stage before death! The manuals fail to give any detail about what happens after Union (or any step inside of this stage), except for the question of Transformative Union described by Saint John of the Cross, which is, in fact, an intensification of the Fire that has transformed us, and a transition to an active form of the Divine Fire. Works such as the entry into the promised land of Origen (Commentary on Numbers 14), “Mystical Theology” of Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite, “The Life of Moses” of St. Gregory of Nyssa, the “Ladder of Divine Ascent” of St. John Climacus, “The Itinerary of the Soul to God” of St. Bonaventure, etc., all instinctively placed union at the end of the journey, as the culmination of the path, the realisation of our life on earth, the supreme fulfilment. They were followed by the scholastic theorists of Spiritual Theology (or Mystical Theology), such as Blessed Bartholomew of the Martyrs, O.P., Philip of the Blessed Trinity, O.C.D., Anthony of the Holy Ghost, O.C.D., Thomas Vallgornera, O.P., Schram, O.S.B.
Involved in this process of the imitation of Christ as presented to us in the Gospel, and in the first Christian authors: the masters of spiritual life, and the monks whose primary aim is to follow Christ to the end, there is a dimension we must keep to the forefront of our thinking. This dimension seems to intertwine seamlessly with the first (following Jesus), namely, the spiritual life, the monk’s life, is in imitation of the angels! The ultimate stage hereby offered to us is to reach Contemplation! In fact, in heaven, the entire heavenly occupation of the saints and the angels is to contemplate God in the beatific vision, so why not begin this activity here on earth? To reiterate: the monastic life was understood very early on as an imitation of the life of the angels! The ideal was twofold both in Christ who dies and the angels who contemplate God! This is the very goal we seek – here on earth to join the angels in heaven, to take the place of the fallen angels (see this doctrine, for example, in Saint Augustine’s City of God), and to praise and contemplate God. This is the Goal of the Monk and his office here on earth!
This is why the scheme of the Greek philosophers, which presents spiritual growth in three stages, with the last being contemplation (union), was easily integrated into our understanding of the Journey, indicating that the goal of the Christian life is union with God—that is, supreme contemplation—namely, being in God the Son and united to Him, before the Eternal Father, in the Holy Spirit. This tripartite scheme of the Greek philosophers (purification, illumination, union) found no difficulty being incorporated almost verbatim into the Christian faith. The final goal is indeed union! And when we say “final goal,” we place it at the end of our lives! For what more can we expect if we have reached the summit, if we have attained the level of the angels? The next stages to join the angels then consist of dying and being inducted into the beatific vision of God.
Saint Francis
Saint Francis wanted to follow Christ with all his being, with total fervour and described his Rule as being simply the Gospel itself, i.e. Christ in the Gospel, and the Apostles’ life as described in the Gospel. However, taking the Gospel as Rule may simply lead us to follow Christ to His death and to die with Him. In this sense, the Gospel would lead us to martyrdom. “There is no greater love than this—that a man should lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). In this sense, too, the time dedicated to participating in the Passion (suffering prior to death) is, as for Christ, rather brief.
How do we move from this clear Gospel pattern—a pattern that ends with Christ’s death and thus our martyrdom—to a pattern like that of the Apostles’, which includes a continuation after the Resurrection and Pentecost? The questions we should be addressing then should be: is there an evolution in the apostolic time in our understanding of the Journey? Is this development visible in the Gospels? In fact, the Gospel were not written at the same time yet they do offer us a vision of the development of Christian doctrine in the first century. Matthew and Mark were written first. Then came Luke (probably after the year 70, maybe 85) and finally John (after 96). Closer examination of the various schema of awareness reveals the follow:
1. Matthew’s schema ends with “Go and preach the Gospel to all” (Mt. 28) (It is not clear if we die with Christ here)! Mark’s ends with the Death and Resurrection (Our death and then eternal life?).
2. Luke’s schema integrates a continuation with that of the Acts of the Apostles (which does not end with Paul’s death, but with his imprisonment (see end of Acts)). In this sense, there is a clear opening towards a future that goes beyond our passing through the death and resurrection of Christ.
3. John’s schema is actually a double reading of the Gospel. The first level of reading indicates we must be made capable of accessing Christ, His divinity, so that through the second level of reading the same Gospel (i.e. re-reading it again with our being now “in Christ”) we can draw from Him and give to our brothers (see Jn. 1:51 and 2:1-11). His Gospel thus allows for two levels of reading. In fact, it could be further elaborated upon as follows: the first reading to cover chapters 1 to 20, then to continue by re-reading, with our being united to Christ, chapters 1 to 21, practising what Christ did, being sent forth by Him, thus making it a total of 41 chapters.
How Can we Change the Understanding of the Journey?
The Transformation Made by Saint Francis
How then do we move from the Gospel schema, which ends with Christ’s death, to a perspective that tells us that the Passion is not our physical death but rather the death of the Old Man within us, thereby opening a new horizon?
This is the crucial question! How do we understand the Christian life journey? Since it is about “following Christ” and Christ dies, this seems to suggest that we too are destined to die, enduring our martyrdom. On the contrary, we must transition to a deeper understanding of the sequela Christi (following of Christ); we must realise that we do not die at the moment of reaching death with Christ. There is life after this stage. There is a spiritual life, there is an apostolic life, a greatly fruitful life. Note the significance of the life of the Apostles! In consequence, it is now evident that Jesus’ death, in truth, corresponds to deep purification, to the death of the Old Man in us, and not our literal death!
The brief journey of the sequela Christi as presented through the life of martyrs and their short martyrdom needs much deeper exploration. When persecution ends, for instance, we are no longer under threat yet we are still alive, and this can last for years! So what would the next step be then? How should we understand our Christian life? How should we understand our spiritual journey? What then is our real goal here on earth? This is the question posed by the monks, those who desire to follow Christ more closely and yet do not die from persecution.
With the passage of time, and with the deepening of the faith experienced by subsequent generations, we have moved from an ending like that of Matthew or Mark to an ending like that of Luke (which introduces the Acts of the Apostles) and to a redefinition of the apostle, united to Christ, acting in Christ, according to Christ’s example (a second, deeper reading of his Gospel).
In Saint Francis, we find something of this search where he gives himself completely to Christ, according to the Rule of the Gospel. He actively seeks martyrdom – this aspect of his life is fundamental! He rejoices at the death of the first five martyrs (1219) and considers them the premier brothers of his Order. That said, Saint Francis, despite all his efforts to expose himself to the danger of being killed as Christ’s witness among the Muslims, does not die a martyr! This is a great disappointment for one who yearned to embrace martyrdom! Yet isn’t this the Gospel’s Rule?! The Lord’s example to follow? It emphasises that the “classical” ideal to die a martyr just does not work! By comparison a new dimension is offered to him, that of being “set apart” by the stigmata, by a visible identification with Christ-the-Victim for us. It is common knowledge that there are two forms of stigmata: the visible ones (Saint Francis, Padre Pio, and many female saints) and the invisible stigmata. However, the latter must not be underestimated. Saint Paul also said that he bore the marks of Christ: “From now on, let no one cause me trouble, for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus’ suffering” (Gal. 6:17).
Saint Francis is thus led to discover a new added aspect of the spiritual journey, to broaden his understanding of the Gospel (remember: his Rule is the Gospel. All Religious Orders have Rules.). He realises that martyrdom is the only and quickest solution to reach the summit of the spiritual journey, it must be understood that there are other stages: the final stage in his life, before his holy death, the final stage in his life, he is to be offered a participation in the Lord’s Passion! What a Mission… Clearly union with the Lord is not the final say, not the final stage in the spiritual journey. This will be confirmed later in the history of Spiritual Theology, when St. Therese, Doctor of the Church, the greatest saint of modern times, a milestone and a yardstick in Spiritual Theology will say: “Quand je pense que je meurs dans un lit! j’aurais voulu mourir dans une arène….” (when I think that I am dying in a bed! I would have wanted to die in an arena…” (like the first martyrs in the Roman theatres)). With these words Therese teaches us through her life, showing us that after union, after having offered herself to the Love of God and having received the flares of love as Saint John of the Cross describes them in the Living Flame, there is something else: this dwelling in the land of darkness, with sinners, loving the Lord for them and with them, and with them asking for forgiveness, up to the very moment of her holy death.
This new understanding of the Rule of the Gospel, which Saint Francis was led to discover thanks to his generosity of heart, is an expansion of his initial understanding of the Gospel. At the start he understood it instinctively as bringing our journey to an end with Christ’s death, through a following of Christ that leads to our own martyrdom. This new understanding is like the transition from the presentation of Matthew-Mark to that of Luke-Acts and then to John (with its two layers of meaning).
This now begs the important question: in the life of the person who follows the Lord, what is His Passion? For instance, therefore, in the life of the Apostles and the Gospels writers, what is it to witness the Lord’s Passion? Does it indicate their death? After what we have now come to realise, it would be better to say it is rather the death of the Old Man in them. Let us remember Saint Peter’s behaviour even right before the beginning of the Passion. He said to Christ with fervour, generosity and conviction (the conviction of the Old Man): I will defend you; I will die for you. But who was speaking at that moment? It was the Old Man in him. A similar response was elicited from him when he rejected the perspective of the death of his Master when the latter announced it the first time: “No never, this won’t happen to you”. The Master, however, showed us that the one who was speaking in Peter was his old man, his old self which needed to be purified and transformed.
This is why Saint Matthew, when he places the Parable of the Sower (Mt. 13) after the Sermon on the Mount (5-7) and the first apostolic efforts of the Apostles (Mt. 10), is in fact showing us that it is not enough to follow Jesus to be really ensuring steady growth. On the contrary, we need to pay attention to the way we listen to Him and then to put his words into practice. In fact, with the language of the Parables, the shift operated by the Lord is radical. He invites us to focus not on the Seed of His Word (He gave it in the Sermon on the Mount Mt. 5-7), but on the soil, i.e. the way we receive his Word! Indeed, He went so far as to give us three unfruitful way, dead-end ways of receiving his word and only one productive way He named as The Good Soil, i.e. Mary. Consequently it becomes crystal clear that it is not enough to simply have Jesus as our goal, as the One we are following. We need to observe and examine with great care how we listen to Him. Hence the absolute importance of the Parable of the Sower as a major turning point in our reflection regarding the spiritual journey. With the Parable of the Sower the Lord opens our eyes to see that there are two vital factors in our spiritual life: who to follow; how do we listen to Him. He warned us repeatedly: “watch out for the way you listen to my words”. “Therefore consider carefully how you listen. Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what they think they have will be taken from them.” (Luke 8:18)
When reading the Gospel, therefore, it is important to follow the Lord. It is important to carry the Cross of our own purification (each day brings its own challenge), until we reach his Passion. It is important to embrace his Passion, to meditate upon it, and to appreciate with immense gratitude all that Christ has achieved for us. This stage is vital for us, but it does not conclude our death will be imminent, and that our spiritual journey has reached its peak. It means in the main that our receiving his Passion into our life, leads the Old Man in us (the Old Self) to die, and allows the New Man in us to rise, and have new life, with a new doctrine (documented in the forty days of apparitions and instructions of the Lord to the Apostles) and the coming of the flames of the Holy Spirit (Pentecost, see Saint John of the Cross’ Living Flame of Love). In this sense, these stages reveal the need for our purification and transformation to allow us not only to be united with the Lord, but also to enable us to be commissioned by Him to go forth and carry on his work… indeed, our death occurs much after. A new life of service will now start, and a new fecundity will be given to us: “The smallest act of pure love is more useful to the Church than all other works combined.” (Saint John of the Cross, Spiritual Canticle B, Introduction of Stanza 29; see also Saint Therese, Manuscript B 4v°)
To express it succinctly then, in this sense we are invited to embrace the Passion twice in our life: once when we receive it, when we are purified by the Lord: as we commence our climb towards Union climbing toward Union. Secondly, when we descend with the Lord to embracing Him more fully in our neighbour as beings set apart to participate in His redemptive love.
Read also
– The Spiritual Journey in 11 Diagrams (important)
– The Spiritual Journey and the School’s Formation (important)
