Weekday Vigils
THE ENJOYMENT OF GOD
From “The Golden Epistle” by William of St Thierry 2
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To “seek the face of God” is to seek knowledge of him face to face, as Jacob saw him. It is of this knowledge the Apostle says: “Then I shall know as I am known; now we see in a confused reflection in a mirror, but then we shall see face to face, we shall see him as he is.” Always to seek God in this life by keeping the hands unstained and the heart clean is that piety which, as Job says, “is the worship of God.” The man who lacks it “has received his soul in vain,” that is to say, lives to no purpose or does not live at all, since he does not live the life to live which he received his soul.
This piety is the continual remembrance of God, an unceasing effort of the mind to know him, an unwearied concern of the affections to love him, so that, I will not say every day, but every hour finds the servant of God occupied in the labor of ascesis and the effort to make progress, or in the sweetness of experience and the joy of fruition. This is the piety concerning which the Apostle exhorts his beloved disciple in the words: “Train yourself to grow up in piety; for training the body avails but little, while piety is all-availing, since it promises well both for this life and for the next.
The habit you wear promises not only the outward form of piety but its substance, in all things and before all things, and that is what your vocation demands. For, as the apostle says again, there are some who exhibit the outward form of religion although they are strangers to its meaning.
If anyone among you does not possess this in his heart, display it in his life, practice it in his cell, he is to be called not a solitary but a man who is alone, and his cell is not a cell for him but a prison in which he is walled. For truly to be alone is not to have God with one. Truly to be walled in is not to be at liberty in God. Solitude and being walled in are words that denote wretchedness, whereas the cell should never involve being walled in by necessity but rather be the dwelling-place of peace, an inner chamber with closed door, a place not of concealment but of retreat.
The man who has God with him is never less alone than when he is alone. It is then he has undisturbed fruition of his joy. It is then he is his own master and is free to enjoy God in himself and himself in God. It is then that in the light of truth and the serenity of a clean heart a pure soul stands revealed to itself without effort, and the memory enlivened by God freely pours itself out in itself. Then either the mind is enlightened and the will enjoys its good or human frailty freely weeps over its shortcomings.
Accordingly as your vocation demands, dwelling in heaven rather than in cells, you have shut out the world, whole and entire, from yourselves and shut up yourselves, whole and entire, with God. For the cell (cella) and heaven (coelum) are akin to one another: the resemblance between the words is borne out by the devotion they both involve. For both appear to be derived from celare, to hide, and the same thing is hidden in cells as in heaven, the same occupation characterizes both the one and the other. What is this? Leisure devoted to God, the enjoyment of God.
2
The Golden Epistle – William of St Thierry – Cistercian Fathers Series #12 – Cistercian Publications – Kalamazoo, MI – 1971 – pg.