Pentecost, 1942

St. Teresia Benedicta a Cruce.jpg

Who are you, sweet light that fills me and illumines the darkness of my heart?  You guide me like a mother's hand, and if You let me go, I could not take another step.  You are the space that surrounds and contains my being.  Without you it would sink into the abyss of nothingness from which You raised it into being.  You, closer to me than I to myself, more inward than my innermost being -- and yet unreachable, untouchable, and bursting the confines of any name: Holy Spirit -- eternal love! Are you not the sweet manna which flows from the heart of the Son into mine, food for angels and for the blessed? He who from death to life arose, has awakened me, too, to new life, from the sleep of death, new life He gives me day by day.  Some day His abundance will completely flow through me, life of Your life -- yes, You Yourself: Holy Spirit -- eternal life!

Are you the ray that flashes from the Eternal Judge's throne to pierce into the night of my soul, which never knew itself?  Merciful, yet unrelenting, it penetrates the hidden crevices.  The soul takes fright at sight of her own self, makes room for holy awe, for the beginning of that wisdom descending from on high, and anchoring us securely in the heights, -- for Your workings, which create us anew: Holy Spirit -- all-penetrating ray!