A Mutual Exchange of Love

When we enter into relationship with God, it is a mutual exchange of love, and it is in this exchange that God reveals himself. He reveals himself in the measure in which we love him. We look upon God as a Father, who is unceasingly communicating to us his thoughts and desires, and it is by these thoughts and desires that we live. He becomes our very soul and innermost life. His Spirit abides in the depth of our spirit, enlightening, encouraging, and directing us. We recognize that it is He who is calling us. We share with him all our joys and sorrows and he is the confidant of all of our hours. We enter into a relationship that is at once living, continuous, and full of delight – a relationship between the soul and its divine Guest, which grows in intensity. ~ Dom Augustin Guillerand, O. Cart. 

These words are from a meditation written by Dom Guillerand who was a French Carthusian monk that I found in Magnificat 2 years ago. I held onto it because it was so beautiful and because it was from the day my mom died. I keep it in my journal along with a picture of my mom that was taken with me and my sister Diane on 9/6/2009, the last day she was up and about. That evening she became very weak and needed complete assistance to do anything. We transferred her to the hospital bed in their den that evening and this is where she stayed until she died.

I strive for perfection in this mutual exchange of love that I have with the Father. It is through the perfect love that God the Father has for his Son that the Holy Spirit is born. My love for our Father will never be perfect because of my sinfulness but I can strive for perfection. The more I open up to Him, the more I am able to receive the thoughts and desires he has for me. This enables me to live the life he is calling me to live. He consumes my very soul. And while I often feel like I don’t belong, that I am on the outside looking in; I know I belong to Him. We are in this world, but we are not of this world. I try to be strong, not letting others know how much I am hurting or how lost I sometimes feel. But with God, I don’t need to do this. I can be me in his presence. He already knows all my thoughts; all my fears and failures, all my desires and joys, but he wants me to share them with him. It is through this constant sharing, that my relationship with him grows and strengthens.