The Purity of Charity: The Way of Silent Love

I have blogged a couple of entries in reference to the Way of Silent Love in Carthusian spirituality. The Apostle Paul writes to the Galatian Christians and says, "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me." What is very interesting about a discussion on the purity of heart is that each of us only knows ourselves and our weaknesses all too well. Unless of course, we live with blinders on and never go the depths of self-examination. The grace of love that conforms us to have a purity of heart is a grace received where there is no illusion as to what it is, God's free gift of his love. As believers, we should seek that special quality, a certain surrendering and gratefulness for God's love, that only those who have come to know the depth of their forgiveness are able to experience. This knowledge moves to avoid absurdities of understanding the meaning of purity of heart that are to characterize our lives. We are all frail and need to protect ourselves from our own weaknesses. To be honest with ourselves means that we come to understand what the monk says, "Purity of heart involves well-balanced vigilance and an appropriate self-distrust." This is why the writer continues saying,

Purity of heart is purity of love. We are pure in the measure that we love. Love is always pure. Because God is love, love is purity itself. Everything that springs from love is good and holy. Everything that does not spring from love is not good. But even in this case, what we do seeks to take on the name of love; and to some extent there is always a certain love that motivates all of our actions. Except that this is love gone wrong, shackled, distorted; a love that disproves Love, because it doesn't want to accept the ordering of love by which each specific love finds its true place in relationship with substantial Love. Love originates all true love; cut off from Love, love is nothing but a body without a soul, an obliterated face, a non-love.

When we are looking to discover our vocations from God our starting point must always be our vocation to love God first and foremost. This is why the Apostle Peter tells us that "we have purified our hearts by our obedience to the truth so that you have genuine mutual love, love one another deeply from the heart. You have been born anew, not of perishable but of imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God." )1 Peter 1:22-23. Do you know how we know that we love selfishly? When we love with expectations of return for ourselves. May God help us not to grieve the Holy Spirit and let us love with all our heart, with all our strength, with all our mind. This is true purity of heart.