So many deep intuitions of the heart
which cannot adequately be expressed in speech…
To be affixed within the Heart of Christ Crucified
through silence, solitude, and spiritual nakedness
allows the mystery of encounter and communion
to blossom forth from this place, and to spread.
This place of intimate solitude,
—the unspeakable depths of the Redeemer’s love
cradling in itself all creation, and each heart, unique—
opens up the space of naked, loving encounter,
and thus weaves us back together in intimacy.
In the depths of his loving embrace,
the Crucified One, the One risen from the dead,
twitches the threads of love and unity
in the depths of each human heart,
and draws us together as one
within the sinews of his own Sacred Heart.
Yet this is a Heart pierced by love, and by love wounded,
yet in Love eternally whole and complete,
open in the expansiveness of life and joy,
beloved Son of the Father and Spouse of every soul,
drawing us together in himself into the Trinity’s embrace
there to dwell, forevermore, eternally,
in the ceaseless joy of the risen life.
This is a life that, by his grace and love
is made new and restored, consummated,
through that wounded flesh victorious over death,
and whole precisely in its openness:
solitude given to solitude, and solitude receiving,
in the intimate personal interpenetration
in which Lover lives in the beloved, beloved in the Lover,
and all are bound together in the single embrace of Love.
This mystery…this mystery entrusted to me,
alive within my heart, my life!
This inner core, this mysterious heartbeat
from which all flows, and to which it returns.
To abide here, vulnerable in nakedness,
naked in solitude, and in solitude united to all,
and from this solitary union, in Christ,
in Christ to welcome each person entrusted to me in love.
Like ripples from a stone cast into water,
like a magnet drawing shards of metal to itself,
is Love raised up in intimacy with the Father, drawing,
and pouring out his flesh and blood, sheltering and nourishing.
The hearts within this world yearn for this,
to be drawn by love, and by love to be pursued,
taken up in the very arms of tenderness,
nourished and sheltered by the other’s very life,
blood and flesh, heart and soul,
receiving all the blood, flesh, heart, and soul
that are in me, given and received.
This sacred space, this mystery…
alive in each and every heart!
To touch this, to draw near,
shoes removed, bowing my face to the ground,
humble and reverent before the mystery
of God’s love for the other,
and of the other’s virginal truth,
burning like a flame, throbbing like a heartbeat
in the inner solitude of their being
as they abide before him, alone,
and open in unspeakable longing
for the intimacy and communion
in which alone the restless heart is at rest.
To touch the other in this place,
to receive them in his name…
reverencing in tenderness and compassion
the vulnerability which is entrusted into my hands,
placed within my heart, my flesh, my blood,
and here sheltered as in a womb.
And thus, from encountering in the Heart of Christ,
in the Heart of Christ, together, we are drawn,
as loving compassion carves out space in them
for the outpouring love that you desire to give,
and also draws them closer, God, into your embrace…
I myself approach you, who are always here,
and, bearing them lovingly within myself,
I offer my heart and soul, my blood and flesh,
with the body, blood, soul, and divinity
of the Crucified and Risen One
who is raised up on the altar of the Cross
and in the sacred Eucharistic Host:
A gift for you, surrendered in filial trust,
a gift for them, outpouring in tenderness,
manifesting the spousal love of Christ
and your own paternal love,
most beautiful and loving Father of us all,
in whose embrace we are cradled unceasingly.