St. Francis had attained a wondrous purity of soul and body, yet he never stopped purifying the eyes of his spirit with a flood of tears...He preferred to lose the light of his eyes rather than dry up the fervor of his spirit by damming up his tears which cleansed his interior sight and rendered him able to see God.
St. Bonaventure - Major Life
Thursday, August 10, 2006
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Brother Lesser, Honora of Sea Roses and I were just talking about the gift of tears recently, and I thought it had to do with softening our hardened hearts. I didn't realize it had to do with purification. Thank you for this.
ReplyDeleteI've always thought they do both: soften hard hearts and take away the debris, thus purifying us.
ReplyDeleteThe religious traditions honor the gift of tears and have found ways to ritualize it. During the Passover Seder, when Jews rememher their escape from Egypt, they bring saltwater to their lips to symbolize the tears of bondage. When a person died in ancient times, mourners put their tears in bottles and sometimes even wore them around their necks. Over the ages, the weeping of tears has been a sign of the mystical experiences of saints and repentant sinners. These transcendent moments go beyond what the mind can comprehend; tears are a response of the heart.
ReplyDeleteThe early Christian desert fathers and mothers had the highest regard for what they called "the gift of tears." Alan Jones, dean of Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, says these drops "are like the breaking of the waters of the womb before the birth of a child." That's a wonderful way to describe the connection between pain and joy.
The tears shed by those who have received the gift of tears are not shed in desperation or turmoil but rather in peace, thanksgiving and rejoicing, in offering the eternal eucharist of the heart where unceasingly we watch and pray. For many in our modem world the gift of tears is unknown.
ReplyDeleteSlowly we come to understand the true gift of tears as God's invitation to join in the work of redemption. This gift is given by God's grace. It visits us gently in the still of the dark night when quietly we are inspired to hold God's people before Him in prayer.
We blend our tears with the tears of our Saviour for the great loss we all experienced in being exiled from the garden of paradise. Here our hearts are filled with yearning. Here we can feel the intense need for reconciliation. Here we are inspired to pray for the gift of tears, that by God's grace we may become true bearers of His image aflame with love and devotion, tender merciful, compassionate, watchful, offerings of purity, desirous of the holiness our Lord would bestow upon us and the whole world.
St. Symeon, the New Theologian, instructed his monks never to receive without tears. Holy Communion should never be casual, but should always be prepared for, and thanked for.
ReplyDeleteThank you for these detailed explanations/reflections regarding my comment. I will print this out so I can read it more slowly and ponder it.
ReplyDeleteI guess I should have known this, because I've read The Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart a couple of times, and St. Symeon the New Theologian's writings are a great part of that book; but maybe we only absorb certain things at certain times in our lives. It is so good when we find others who will teach us...
it is marvelous how, when we reread a passage of scripture we are given a totally different view of it each time. God knows what, when, where, how and why the appropriate times to shower upon us new insights into his magnificient being.
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