Transcript of Abbot Clement’s talk on Monday, 1 July, 2002

        The Lord said to Conchita de Armida, the Venerable mystic: "I want to possess you and I want you to possess me." And she says, "how can I do that?" "Grow in purity." First of all, the statement is really a statement of our faith on the Eucharist. We all profess that when we receive the Eucharist, the Eucharist doesn’t turn into us but we turn into Jesus. So it’s putting a personal face and a wish and an intention on this action. So, it’s nothing extraordinary. Or put it another way, we all know we’re called to union with God. But the important thing is the question of purity. The last time we talked about the need to identify my venial sins and my affection for them and work at them.

        Purity here doesn’t just mean sensual, sexual problems. It means all those obstacles of attachment that I have that make me resistant or slow to respond fully to God’s will. If God’s will toward me right now is loving, efficacious, what He does works from his point of view then the only obstacle between his present love for me and his will for me is me. And so purity is necessary because Jesus went on to say to her "to the degree that you are pure you will possess God to the degree you possess God, God will possess you." So then what is the problematic? The problematic is what we learned in the novitiate of course a long time ago, what’s the priority in my life in terms of pleasure? In psychological terminology is the pleasure principal up-front, up top, or gratification, or my comfort is all similar words or affection for things of this world.

        In our culture, which is so materialistic, it’s not very surprising to find that we have that infiltrate the monastery. You know, Time magazine had a picture of a couple and the caption was "Love is a matter of Biology." It’s a question of imprint on the brain and excretions. So all of a sudden, person is out of the picture because that’s too abstract, not tangible enough, and love is a commitment. So in our culture with this is all prevalent I wouldn’t be surprised if we pick up those kinds of thinking. And so what does it mean then to deal with the pleasure principle? It means to put it in, as I said in novitiate, to put it in tenth place because if you put it in second place it’s going to bite you and get back in first place. And so what we have to look at is precisely what do we do with me that seeks gratification? I have to oppose it says psychoanalytic literature. It’s the necessary thing to do if you want real enjoyment to the degree that you say "no" to gratification, then you are open to the possibility to real enjoyment .

        Appreciation. Now of course, you say well that’s science. Open the book of John the Cross and what does he say, " the fly that is attached to honey stops its flight." That’s his image of the soul that’s attached. Even to spiritual consolations. Which means, God cannot be fully possessed. And so you don’t grow in contemplation, you don’t grow in graces. So the Lord said to Conchita another time, he says, "Look, if you want to grow, purity requires mortification." As I ran my life I also was mortified. Well, there it is. There’s the same spiritual principle that psychoanalysis has insisted, don’t give into gratification. Why? Because if you don’t give into gratification then you begin to see your motives and you can choose what is reasonable. So that St. John of the Cross could say, "More pleasing is the soul when in the midst of aridity and trial, do what is the reasonable thing to do than having consolation all the time." It’s the same principle. There’s also an interesting thing in the Rule. Chapter four gives us all kinds of spiritual tools to work at and it’s clear it says, "don’t give in to, don’t satisfy the desires of the flesh." Right there, same principle. And then one after it says, " to hate one’s own will." Higher form of gratification.

        But there’s one just before those two which has been on my mind for awhile, it says, "in daily prayer repent of your past sins with tears and sighs and amend them for the future." So it’s interesting when Conchita was called to this purity she spent a period of her life making acts of contrition for her past sins. She wasn’t scrupulous, she wasn’t fearful, she had a purpose. The point was she’s going to clean the vessel. Now you know when I went to Assumption Parish and I inherited the car that Fr. Ronald used in smoking, I had to clean the car three times with strong soap and a lot of scrubbing and even then with Fr. Christopher who has a lot more sensitive nose than mine, he says, "I still smell the stuff." So if we really understand what it means to be attached to things and not to the Lord, we can see how this habit of not overcoming our sinfulness and not repenting of them leaves us indisposed to God’s action to possess us. Yet we have such a powerful reality of our faith to be honest with you, we should all be saints because the Word, the Second Person of the Trinity comes to us in the Eucharist everyday. Not only that, He’s given us the Spirit, two persons of the Trinity.

        I know the Blessed Mother has a place in there but right now I can only think of two modes. One is intercession and the other is somehow she forms Jesus in us, but I’m not quite sure how that fits fully, I have some idea. So Jesus said in today’s gospel, the guy that says, "let me at least go bury my father." Jesus says, "no, let the dead bury the dead." That’s a terrible statement to make to a Jew. It’s almost an absolute obligation to bury your father. You already got to bury the dead as a corporal work of mercy, but your father! And Jesus says, "No, follow me!" So one of the difficulties we have, I think, is that when we begin to sense what the spiritual life involves we don’t make the connection with the whole mystery of salvation that’s going on from God’s point of view. God didn’t just send his Son, his Son came, died on the cross, and won graces for us. No, Jesus is alive today and Jesus is working today and the work that He’s doing is precisely along this line. To draw us into His life and it’s right here. It’s right in the Eucharist. We gather to praise God. It’s here. It’s encouraging because it’s something that we don’t have to do under our own power. All we have to do is cooperate, remove the obstacles and allow the Holy Spirit to transform us.