Commemoration of the Piercing of the Heart of St. Therese, August 26
»Among Therese's virtues, her love for God stands out, which our Lord Jesus Christ amplified through numerous visions and revelations. In one vision, He chose her as His bride; in another, Therese saw an angel standing beside her, who pierced her heart with a burning spear. These heavenly gifts of God's love ignited such a fire in her heart that with fervent love, she promised to always do what she recognized as more perfect and as belonging to the greater glory of God.«
(Gregory XV, Bull for Canonization)
From the writing "The Fiery Flame of Love" by St. John of the Cross
In the book of Deuteronomy, Moses says that “The Lord our God is a consuming fire” (1). This refers to the fire of love – a fire of infinite power that can consume in a way that is incomparable to any other fire and burns so fiercely that whatever it touches can be transformed into itself. But in every soul it burns and consumes according to how prepared it finds it: some more, some less; and also as much as it desires and how and when it desires. And when this immense fire of love touches the soul somewhat more intensely, it heightens the soul's love, so much so that it seems to her that she burns more than all the fires of the world. And because this divine fire has now transformed the soul into itself, she not only feels its heat, but becomes the furnace of a powerful fire herself.
It is admirable and worth mentioning that this divine fire is so fierce and consuming that it would consume a thousand worlds much more easily than earthly fire a single flax fiber, and yet it does not consume or destroy the souls in which it burns. Rather, it burns gently within them, and with its strength and heat, it delights and divinizes them. For when God shares Himself with the soul in this way, He wishes to grant her greater beauty and greatness; therefore, He does not burden her, but expands her; He does not deplete her, but delights, illuminates, and enriches her.
Happy is the soul that has reached such an excellent estate, by which it becomes that furnace: it knows everything, tastes everything, does everything it wishes, and everything goes well for it (2), no one can overpower it, nothing can touch it. Because this soul is the one of whom the apostle says: The spiritual person can judge all things, but is not subject to the judgment of anyone (3). And elsewhere: “The Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God” (4).
When the soul burns with such love, it may feel as if a seraph pierced it with a spear filled with the most fervent love and penetrated it with this glowing ember (5), or, rather, with that flame, and burned it with such a blazing mark. At that time, the soul feels as if transformed into that powerful flame of love and as if pierced both in the heart and in its innermost being.
Few souls reach this point, but some have reached it, mostly those souls whose virtue and spirit were to be inherited by their sons and daughters. God thus gave the head in the first fruits of the Spirit wealth and strength according to the inheritance that the house was meant to have.
O happy dawn, planted by the One who can only heal! O desired and most happy dawn, for you were planted for nothing else than for the joy of the soul and for its delight! Great is that dawn, for great is He who planted it; and great is the joy, for the fire of love is infinite. Therefore – O blessed dawn!, all the more supremely blessed, the more it has pierced the innermost center of the soul with the furnace of love and burns everything that can be burned, so that it may give everything that can be given.
(1) Dt 4:24; (2) Ps 1:3; (3) 1 Cor 2:15; (4) 1 Cor 2:10; (5) Is 6:6.
(Proprium of the Order of the Barefoot Brothers of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel)
