Chapter 31
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE LOVE
but what our Lord wills to show them. Their charity and desire are also ruled according to the will of our Lord. We ought, like them, to will in this way; then we would will and desire nothing but the will of our Lord, as they do, for we are all one, as God sees things. Here I was taught that we should trust and rejoice only in our Savior, blessed Jesus, for all things.
Chapter 31 Of the longing and the spiritual thirst of Christ, which lasts and shall last until Judgment Day; and [how] by reason of His body He is not yet fully glorified or entirely unable to suffer.
And thus our good Lord answered all the questions and doubts I could invent, saying most comfortingly, "I may make all things well, I can make all things well, I will to make all things well, and I shall make all things well. And you yourself shall see that all manner of things shall be well."
That He says, "I may," I understand for the Father; that He says, "I can," I understand for the Son. Where He says,
"T will to," I understand the Holy Spirit, and where He says, "T shall," I understand the unity of the blessed Trinity, three
Persons and one Truth. Where He says, "You yourself shall see," I understand the joining of all mankind who shall be saved in the blissful Trinity.
In these five words God wills we be enclosed in rest and in peace, and thus shall the spiritual thirst of Christ have an end. For the spiritual thirst of Christ is the love-longing that lasts and ever shall until we see that sight on Judgment Day.
For some of us who shall be saved and shall be Christ's joy and His bliss, some are still here and some are yet to come — and so shall it be right up to that Day. Therefore, this is His thirst: a love-longing to have us all together, whole in Him, for His bliss, as I see it, for we are not as fully whole in Him as we Shall be then.
We know in our faith, and it was also showed in all of this [revelation], that Christ Jesus is both God and man. In the
THE THIRTEENTH SHOWING
godhead, He is Himself the highest bliss, was so from before the beginning, and shall be so without end. This endless bliss can never be made higher or lower in itself. This was abundantly seen in every showing, and specifically in the twelfth, where He says, "I am that which is highest."
But in Christ's manhood, it is known through our faith, and also shown here, that He, by virtue of the godhead, suffered pains and passions and death for love, to bring us to His bliss. These are the works of Christ's manhood, by which He rejoices. He showed that in the ninth revelation, where He says, "It is a joy, a bliss, an endless delight to me that ever I suffered the passion for you." And this is the bliss of Christ's works.
That's what He means where He says, in the same showing, that we are His bliss, we are His reward, we are His glory, we are His crown. For insofar as Christ is our head He is glorified and unable to suffer, but as far as His body, into which all His members are knit, is concerned, He is not yet fully glorified nor entirely unable to suffer. For the same desire, longing and thirst that He had upon the cross and which, as I see it, were in Him from eternity, He has yet, and ever shall have, until the last soul to be saved has come up into His bliss.
As truly as there is in God a property of compassion and pity, so truly is there in Him a property of thirst and longing. By virtue of this longing in Christ, we have to long for Him in response. Without this response, no soul comes to heaven. The property of longing thirst comes from the endless goodness of God, just as the property of pity comes from His endless goodness. But though He has longing and pity, they are two different properties, as I see it. In this [difference] stands the point of the spiritual thirst that will last in Him as long as we are in need, drawing us up to His bliss.
All this was seen in the showing of compassion, for that shall cease on Judgment Day. Thus He has pity and compassion on us, and He has longing to have us, but His wisdom and His love do not allow the end to come until the best time.
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE LOVE
~ Chapter 32 How all things shall be well, and how Scripture shall be fulfilled; and that we must steadfastly hold ourselves in the faith of holy
Church, as is Christ's will.
At one time our good Lord said, "All shall be well," and at another time He said, "You yourself shall see that all manner of things shall be well." In these two sayings the soul took several different understandings.
One was that He wills that we grasp that He pays heed not only to noble and great things but also to little and small, lowly and simple things. He takes heed of both the one and the other, which is what He means when He says, "All manner of things shall be well." He wills that we understand that not even the smallest thing will be forgotten.
Another understanding of these two sayings is this. As we see it, there are many deeds evilly done. So great is the harm they cause, that it seems to us impossible that they should ever come to good. We look upon these deeds sorrowing and mourning so that, on their account, we cannot be at rest in the blissful contemplation of God as we should be. The cause is this: the reasoning we can use now is so blind, so low and so simple that we cannot know the lofty, marvelous wisdom, the power and the goodness, of the blessed Trinity. That is what He means where He says, "You yourself shall see that all manner of things shall be well." It is as if He said, "Take heed now, faithfully and trustfully, and at the last end you shall see it in truth, in the fulness of joy."
And thus from these same five words I have mentioned before ("I may make all things well," etc.), I took very great comfort concerning all the works of our Lord God that are yet to come.
There is a deed that the blessed Trinity shall do on the last day, according to what I saw. When and how the deed shall be accomplished is, and shall remain, unknown to all creatures beneath Christ until the day it is done. What our Lord wills that we know, through His goodness and love, is that the deed will be done. His power and wisdom, by the same
THE THIRTEENTH SHOWING
love, will to conceal and hide from us what the deed will be and how it shall be done.
The reason He wills that we know that the deed will be done is because He wants us to be more at ease in soul and more peaceful in love and to stop looking at all the tempests that could keep us from true rejoicing in him.
This great deed is the one ordained by God from eternity, treasured and hidden in His blessed breast, and only known to Himself. By this deed, He shall make all things well. Just as the blessed Trinity made all things from nothing, so the same blessed Trinity shall make well all that is not well.
At this sight I wondered greatly. I looked at our faith, marveling thus: "Our faith is grounded in God's word, and it is part of our faith that we believe that God's word shall be saved in all things. But one point of our faith is that many creatures shall be damned, like the angels who fell from heaven because of their pride and are now devils. Men, too, who die outside the faith of holy Church (that is to say, heathens), and men who are baptized Christians yet live unchristian lives and so die outside of charity, shall all likewise be damned to hell forever, as holy Church teaches me to believe." Considering all this, it seemed to me impossible that all manner of things should be well, as our Lord had showed me at this time.
Concerning all this, I had no other answer in any showing from our Lord God but this: "What is impossible to you is not impossible to Me. I shall save My word in all things, and I shall make all things well."
Thus was I taught by the grace of God that I should steadfastly hold myself in the faith as I had before understood it, and that I should seriously believe that all manner of things would be well, as our Lord at that same time had showed me. For by the great deed that our Lord shall do He shall save His word in all things and He shall make well all that is not well — though how it shall be done no creature below
Christ knows or shall know until it is done. This is what I understood from what our Lord communicated to me at this time.
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE LOVE
; Chapter 33 All damned souls are despised in the sight of God, like the devil; these revelations do not detract from the faith of holy Church but strengthen it; and the more we busy ourselves to know God's secrets the less we know.
And yet in this showing I wished, as much as I dared, that I could have had a complete view of hell and purgatory. In wishing this, it was not my intention to test anything that faith teaches, for I believed steadfastly that hell and purgatory exist for the same ends that holy Church teaches they do. My intention was to see so that I could learn all about the things that belong to my faith, and because of them live more for God's glory and my profit.
But, for all my desire, I could see nothing of this except what I told you before: the showing where I saw that the devil is reproved by God and endlessly damned. In that sight
I understood that all creatures who share the devil's condition in this life, and die in it, whether they are Christians or not, are no more made mention of by God and all His holy ones than is the devil, despite the fact that they belong to mankind.
Although this was a revelation of goodness and made little mention of evil, I was still not drawn by it from any point of faith that holy Church teaches me to believe. I saw the passion of Christ in several different showings — the first, the second, the fifth and the eighth —as I have said before. I had, in part, a sense of the sorrow of our Lady and of His true friends who saw Him in pain, but I did not see properly specified the Jews, who did Him to death, despite the fact that I knew in my faith that they were accursed and damned without end, except for the ones who were converted by grace.
I was strengthened and taught in general to keep myself in the faith at every point, and in all that I had understood before. I hoped that, with the mercy and grace of God, I was doing so, and in my intentions I desired and prayed that I might continue to, until the end of my life.
It is God's will that we have great regard for all the deeds He has done, for He wills that by them we shall know, trust
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Tit and believe all He shall do, but it is forever necessary for us to stop ourselves from speculating on what the great deed shall be. We should desire to be like our brothers who are saints in heaven; they will nothing but what God wills. Then we would rejoice only in God and would be well satisfied both with what He hides and with what He shows. For I saw in truth that our Lord means us to understand that the more we busy ourselves to know His secrets, in that or anything else, the further away we shall be from knowing them.
Chapter 34 God shows the secrets necessary for His lovers; and how those who diligently receive the preaching of holy Church please God greatly.
Our Lord God showed two kinds of secrets. One is this great secret with all the hidden points belonging to it. He wills that these secrets remain hidden from us in this way until the time He chooses to show them to us clearly.
The second kind are the secrets He wills to make known and open to us, for He wills that we grasp that it is His will that we know them. They are secrets to us not only because He wills that they be hidden from us but because of our blindness and ignorance. On these [lacks] He has great pity, and therefore He wills to make them more open to us Himself so that we may know Him, love Him and cling to Him. For, all that it is expedient for us to grasp and know, our Lord will most courteously show us — and that showing is this revelation with all the preaching and teaching of holy Church.
God showed the very great pleasure He has in all men and women who enthusiastically, humbly, wisely and deliberately accept the preaching and teaching of holy Church. For it is
His holy Church. He is the ground, He is the substance, He is the teaching, He is the teacher, He is the end, He is the reward for which every soul following its nature does difficult labor.
This is known, and shall be known to every soul to which the Holy Spirit declares it. I hope, truly, that He will assist all those who seek this, for they seek God.
LEZ
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE LOVE
All this that I have said up to now, and more that I shall say after this, is a comfort against sin. For in the third showing, when I saw that God does all that is done, I saw no sin. And then I saw that all is well. But it was when God showed me sin that He said, "All shall be well."
Chapter 35 How God does all that is good and suffers honorably all that is evil, by His mercy; and that this will cease only when sin is no longer allowed.
And when God Almighty had shown me some of His goodness so plentifully and completely, I desired to learn whether a certain creature I loved continued in the good living I hoped had been begun by the grace of God. And it seemed that I got in my own way with this desire to know about a particular person, for I received no teaching about it at this time. But then I was answered in my reason, as it were by a friendly adviser, "Take what you are shown as general, and look at the courtesy of the Lord God as He shows it to you. For it is a greater honor to God for you to see Him in everything than in any one, special thing."
I assented, and thus I learned that it is a greater honor to God for us to know all things in general than to delight in any one thing in particular. And if I want to act wisely according to this teaching, not only should I not be glad for any one thing specifically, I should not be greatly disturbed for any kind of thing, for all shall be well. The fulness of joy is to behold God in everything, for by the same blessed power, wisdom and love that He made everything, our good Lord leads it to the same end continuously, will Himself bring it there, and when it is time, we shall see it.
The ground of this teaching was seen in the first showing, and more openly in the third, where it says, "I saw God in a point.... All that our Lord does is done rightfully, and all that He suffers is full of honor." And in these two are encompassed good and evil. For all that is good our Lord does, and what is evil our Lord suffers.