I hope that each one of you have known the kind of love in your life that needs no words – where you sit with your beloved in the silence, perhaps gaze in each other’s eyes and, without a word, speak volumes of love. “May our ears listen to the silence together; may our glances profoundly penetrate each other.” Let’s continue our exploration of this deep union of love our Lord desires with us in the Unity Prayer.
Jesus did not expound explicitly in the Diary on His desire that our ears listen to the silence together but we often see Elizabeth in silence as we do with many great Saints. There is an intentional effort in our society to steal our silence. First, the radio and TV and now, mobile devices like phones do whatever they can to keep our eyes glued to our screens and our ears fixed to our ear buds because the more time we watch or listen to content, the more money they make through advertising or collecting sellable information about our habits. It is truly intentional.
Yet, even if all we listen to is religious programming and all we read is our Bibles, we still need silence. To continuously ingest spiritual knowledge and never have silence is a bit like always eating but never digesting – we would die of starvation; although it is not quite how Saint Paul meant it, we could be “always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth” (II Tim 3:7 NASB). If all we do is serve our husband or wife, busied always with chores around the house, and never take the time to lie quietly in their arms, our hearts beating together, our souls knit in harmony, will our marriage ever reach all it is intended to be? Dwell in His love in silence; share love in silence. We don’t always need to have something to say:
Jesus: “Why are you leaving so quickly? Is there anything more important for you than I? . . . Remain with Me. Do you not see how lonely I am? Do you have nothing to say to Me? This also has no importance. Listen to the silence. Our hearts beat to the same rhythm. May our glances melt in one another. Just tell Me that you love Me and adore Me, also on behalf of others.”
The Spiritual Diary (First Edition); Elizabeth Kindelmann; p. 82
As we grow in union with our Beloved in the silence, as we digest what we learn of Him, we begin to see Him more clearly and we begin to see as He sees. This includes seeing ourselves. Our glances profoundly penetrate each other. We see more clearly His unfathomable greatness, our misery, and His love that reaches across the chasm between us to cleanse us of our misery and transform us into His beauty:
At the dawn prayer, while I was meditating, I saw again the penetrating glance of the Lord’s eyes. The desire of His Heart that He shared with me a while ago, He now asked me for it and not through words, but through the penetrating gaze of His eyes. Oh, these eyes! My bodily eyes cannot withstand His glance. I shut my eyes tightly. Trembling, I could hardly look. The look of His eyes is like a flash of lightning which lights up everything. It penetrated my whole being and I saw all my hidden sins. I cried for hours without stopping. “My sins! Oh, my sins!” I whispered while moaning. While that was happening, the sorrow in my heart for my sins was greater than I had ever experienced it. Meanwhile, the penetrating glance of His eyes rested upon me. This is an unbearable brightness. The Lord said:
ibid.; p. 133
Jesus: “May our glances melt in one another.”
“I, a sinner, a very great sinner! Yet, the glance of my sinful eyes will be one with the glance of Your divine eyes? Not just my eyes, but according to Your desire, the eyes of everyone.” The Lord Jesus said:
Jesus: “May the gaze of he who walks and harvests with Me meld into mine.”
This experience appears identical to that of Saint Faustina:
Divine Mercy in My Soul (Diary of Saint Faustina) Section 852:
Today the Lord’s gaze shot through me suddenly, like lightning. At once, I came to know the tiniest specks in my soul, and knowing the depths of my misery, I fell to my knees and begged the Lord’s pardon, and with great trust I immersed myself in His infinite mercy. Such knowledge does not depress me nor keep me away from the Lord, but rather it arouses in my soul greater love and boundless trust. The repentance of my heart is linked to love. These extraordinary flashes from the Lord educate my soul. O sweet rays of God, enlighten me to the most secret depth, for I want to arrive at the greatest possible purity of heart and soul.
Let us not run from this glance, this truth about God and ourselves but rather meld into it. Only when, through mercy, we see our misery, can we be healed of our misery and brought more fully unto union with our Lord. “Jesus said to them, ‘It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners’” (Mark 2:17 NASB). It’s not that some are healthy; it’s that we all need to see that we are sick before we can be healed! Let us welcome and seek the merciful and loving glance that shows us our sickness that we may be healed and, being healed, be as one.
Quotations from the Diary
p131: Earlier, the Lord Jesus again strengthened me with an amazing grace. He does not make me feel His presence, but He looks at me and accompanies me with the penetrating gaze of His eyes. He said:
. . . . “Take courage. Look at Me. Always look into My eyes because in this new battle that Satan wants to wage against you, the look of My eyes will blind him. This will not happen quickly because I allow you to be tempted. May our glances melt in one another.”
p133: At the dawn prayer, while I was meditating, I saw again the penetrating glance of the Lord’s eyes. The desire of His Heart that He shared with me a while ago, He now asked me for it and not through words, but through the penetrating gaze of His eyes. Oh, these eyes! My bodily eyes cannot withstand His glance. I shut my eyes tightly. Trembling, I could hardly look. The look of His eyes is like a flash of lightning which lights up everything. It penetrated my whole being and I saw all my hidden sins. I cried for hours without stopping. “My sins! Oh, my sins!” I whispered while moaning. While that was happening, the sorrow in my heart for my sins was greater than I had ever experienced it. Meanwhile, the penetrating glance of His eyes rested upon me. This is an unbearable brightness. The Lord said:
Jesus: “May our glances melt in one another.”
“I, a sinner, a very great sinner! Yet, the glance of my sinful eyes will be one with the glance of Your divine eyes? Not just my eyes, but according to Your desire, the eyes of everyone.” The Lord Jesus said:
Jesus: “May the gaze of he who walks and harvests with Me meld into mine.”
Flame of Love Basics Series: The Unity Prayer