There are realities that probably shouldn’t be talked about too much, but rather realized. And that is prayer and inner life. This topic is, therefore, quite ungrateful for some kind of monologue. Especially since most students have the feeling that what they have already heard, they know, but also that they realize it. It is a pretty catastrophic deformation of us, European people. Therefore, it is quite dangerous to provide too many concrete facts. It is always important to reveal only the first step, and until one makes it, to not reveal more to them. The danger in this is that someone may have perhaps ten steps already while I only have five, but that makes it all the more likely that you will understand me in my difficulties.
When we talk about spiritual life, we often think of realities that are the means of spiritual life. When we talk about spiritual life, we say: This is prayer, self-denial, fasting, liturgy, confession, reading of Scripture. But spiritual life is none of this. These are merely means of spiritual life. Spiritual life, we should correctly say, is simply life. If life is not spiritual, it is not life at all. We should learn to think in God’s way. Only he who lives in God, and in whom God lives, truly lives. And if a person lives in connection with God, then they live a spiritual life. We can call it friendship with God, grace, or relationship of love. If a person does not live like this, they do not live at all, even if they exhibit certain symptoms of life. Such a person walks, thinks, acts, snacks, rests, works, but they are in death. It is a very dangerous delusion. Therefore, we have also begun to call life as such spiritual life, to somehow distinguish it. We talk about spiritual life where a person lives in connection with God, in friendship with God, or at least strives for it. The first difficulty arises from the fact that a person is born as a spiritually dead being, deaf, blind, closed to all spiritual influences. We call this unfortunate inheritance original sin, which marks all humanity and all creation. And while God is, people do not perceive Him. While they speak, and some spiritual authors even say that they scream, people do not hear Him. While God reveals Himself, people do not see Him. A basic reality is missing, that is the contact, the perception of man and God.
The spiritual life begins with a tremendous activity from God, breaking through our death, our deafness, our muteness. That into which we are closed and which we resist against God. When the prophet spoke of this reality of death, apostasy, and deafness of the Israelite nation, he beautifully expressed it in the 11th chapter of the prophet Hosea. “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt, I called my son. The prophets called them, but they turned away from them and sacrificed to the Baals; they burned incense to carved images. Although I taught Ephraim to walk, he took them up to the idols; they did not know that I healed them. I drew them with human cords, with bands of love. I was to them as those who took the yoke from their neck; I bent down and fed them. They shall not return to the land of Egypt, but Assyria shall be their king, because they refused to return to me.” It is a painful prophet's lament over the situation of Israel, which did not perceive God. That God nurtured him from nothing and he turned to imagined gods. God loved him and even, as the prophet Hosea says: “I drew him with human cords, with bands of love.” How else can God approach man than in a human way, as man does not perceive God? And so He attracts, entices, penetrates into his life, nourishes him, takes care of him, and waits. Because He respects human freedom, He waits for the person to see, hear, respond, and ultimately begin to perceive and then reply. Thus begins the spiritual life.
The whole spiritual life consists of this cooperation: God’s activity and human response. In the beginning, therefore, is God, who enters our lives in this way, and we first learn to perceive God. This sensitivity to God’s things must be learned by every person. And everyone learns it in a different way. They learn it by perceiving the love of another person, and without realizing it, they thus perceive God. Because behind every love stands God. Whether it is maternal love, friendship, engagement, wherever a person perceives love, God is using that love to draw them closer. Through the relationship with nature, where a person can see, admire, these are all human cords by which God draws a person. Cords of love. There are also events that each of us encounters in life, various meetings, but there are also moments when we are alone when we listen to ourselves or moments when we feel abandoned, crushed by illness. These moments are immensely important for spiritual life. God is a permanent presence next to man, for man. When God reveals His name to Moses, He said to him: “I am the one who is here for you, for you.” This is God, who is here not just with us, but is here in relation to us and specifically for us. Therefore, it is essential for a person, who is born as a being without relationship, to become a relational person. And that is why every human relationship aids the spiritual life. Whenever a person somehow develops in relation to others. And whether a person is aware of it or not, from the very first moment when the mother bends over their crib and when they respond and gradually learn to reply to these expressions of love, and learn to take into account those around them, their siblings, classmates, and begin to perceive someone else, and even enter into a relationship with someone, all of this prepares them for spiritual life. Because spiritual life does not exist without relationships. It is a reality that exists only in a personal dimension. Just like all means of spiritual life. We cannot understand prayer if we do not understand that the foundation is precisely this perception of God. It may happen that our prayer is a pagan cult. Just something I “mumble” without regard for God. Or that I want to achieve something, to break someone, and thus I end up completely elsewhere than I should be. I create my gods with a Christian coating. But our God is the one I must first perceive as a being and then enter into a relationship with. Even if that relationship is at first very hidden, not very personal, it still deepens to an inner relationship of love and ultimately the devotion of a person to God. Spiritual life leads us to let ourselves be gifted by God. God encompasses us and a person continually realizes that everything is a gift and all is grace. And until this genuinely reaches the person and they discover that God not only gave them everything but gave them Himself, a desire will grow in their heart to give God everything and ultimately themselves.
Spiritual life, therefore, has only a personal nature. It is a matter of a relationship of love, devotion, fidelity. It is sensitivity to God’s guidance. It is sensitivity to God, who is with us, who is in us.
Therefore, any form of poverty greatly helps spiritual life. By poverty, we do not mean misery. This poverty may be our old age, our limitations, as well as economic poverty, the poverty of beauty, the poverty of sick or disabled people. That is a lack that in some way limits us and leads us to listen. Poverty that makes us humble and receptive to God. Thus, it may easily happen that a disabled person who quickly orients himself in his poverty can very soon be much closer to God than all official servants of the church. The danger of external activity, which we consider spiritual life, is indeed too great. And a person limited by their poverty carries an inner attitude that calls out to God. Therefore, these moments lead us to God. Through the emptiness within us, we reach God. It is a great disposition. That is why we must value these life situations and givens and love poverty. A person who loves poverty is not afraid of aging, hair loss, losing teeth, graying, diminishing strength because they know how much they need God in those moments. And thus, they learn to live in dependence on God. The great danger of youth is that a person needs God but lives as if they don’t need Him, because they can rely on themselves. St. Teresa of Ávila says that God alone is enough. And some student might say: “God is sometimes enough.” Most of the time, we rely on ourselves. Only when various more challenging situations come, for example, exam periods, etc.
God therefore enters our lives. And it is precisely in these moments of poverty that we are more sensitive, more perceptive, more in need. And that is why we are closer to God. It is much easier to understand the signs that God gives. He created us with a tremendous gift of freedom. It is strange that the boundary He established for Himself He never crossed. In a way, He becomes helpless against us when He respects our freedom. And that is why He only gives signs. These signs need to be learned to understand and perceive. People would like clarity, and so they created idols. God gives signs of love and hope. You, young people, will understand these signs of love best.
When a young female student is in love with a young male student, she wants to show it. What does she do? “Hey, Franta, haven’t you noticed how beautiful I am?” If she said that, Franta would certainly respond: “I noticed, but surely for someone else.” However, that girl somehow gives signs of love. Usually, it is more girls who respect freedom. Boys, they are the aggressors. And they misinterpret the statement of the Gospel that the violent take the kingdom of God by force. Thus, they do not respect that freedom much. In this, girls resemble God far more than we do. Somehow, a person shows their love and waits for a free response. Hence, the non-violence, these are the cords of love by which the Lord drew Israel. And God draws every person in this way. And a person either perceives it or does not. And God waits, the greatest fun then is that at the moment when it dawns on a person, they say: “I found God.” God gives signs of love and waits, and these signs can be anything. It can be a sunset, a flying bird, joy in my heart, the gaze of a child, an old person dying. All these can be words of love for me.
Then God gives a sign of hope. This is for those who are moving forward. Signs that guide us. And just as we usually keep signs of love to ourselves, it is important that we speak of signs of hope. So that we can share how God leads us. Because God leads each one individually and yet together. We are all under God’s direct guidance. God intervenes in each of our lives, while connecting us all into a unified flow. Therefore, it is such a great encouragement for us when we see how God leads this brother, this sister, this community, how God blesses here, because that is also a sign of hope for me. That is a sign that behind this step is another step, that this path does not lead to emptiness, that it has a goal, that it is being realized. Each of us may sometimes feel that with the next step we are already at a wall. That is why signs of hope are so important, so we do not renounce God, who is hidden. So that we do not conjure up signs that are not God’s. It is necessary to patiently walk the path of faith. This is how God acts with man before man breaks into a relationship with God. And then he starts to become increasingly aware of his dependence. Life itself can only be lived in dependence on God. And a person purposely learns this dependence. What Jesus expressed in these words: “Without me, you can do nothing.” A person knows this theoretically, has heard a sermon about it many times, and sometimes even experienced it, before it sinks into the depths of human being, before a person knows that only from God’s gift they breathe, have food, live, can move, that they woke up and could go to sleep in the evening, only then does he begin to live completely dependent on God. This is true spiritual life, to live in connection with God as we are capable. This does not mean that God takes away our freedom. Dependence on God liberates a person, develops their personality, for otherwise, God would deny Himself. Only dependence on God makes a person a person. In God, a person finds their own face, their own identity. If you have ever met a person who has lived for years, decades with God, you have seen how their eyes shine. How their face is spiritual. It may be wrinkled, unattractive, but there is a glow in it because it reflects God. This happens when a person finds in God themselves, their own identity. Outside of God, a person can never be truly themselves. Even if they were the most capable, they are never what they are called to be by God. Disconnecting from God has made them a creature of creation. It is, in fact, a corruption of development, a cancerous tumor. Therefore, it is essential and the essence of spiritual life is, after the initial perception of God, to continue to approach God more and live in connection with Him.
The first part of the transcript of the audio recording of the lecture by P. Cyril Vojtěch Kodet
for students on the pilgrimage of academic youth in Velehrad.
May 30, 1992
continuation
