Augustinian Path to Vocational Discernment (Part 5)
2 March, 2022Are we sensitive during Christmas? When we talk about sensitivity we usually think of a very emotional, extremely apprehensive and quite delicate person; who cries very easily. This concept of sensitivity does not help us to walk the path of Advent as a time of preparation for Christmas. So what is it all about?
Saint Augustine himself will help us enter more deeply into human sensitivity, since he was a man who not only had a restless heart, but was also very sensitive; even to tears. For him, sensitivity has to do with activating the five senses with vivacity: sight👁️, hearing👂🏼, smell👃🏼, taste👅 and touch🖐🏼. It is about energizing the five senses not only in their own sensory way – looking, hearing, smelling, tasting and feeling – but also something even more radical. It is all about connecting inwardly to God. These are the words of our Father Saint Augustine:
“Late have I loved you, beauty so old and so new: late have I loved you. And see, you were within and I was in the external world and sought you there, and in my unlovely state I plunged into those lovely created things which you made. You were with me, and I was not with you. The lovely things kept me far from you, though if they did not have their existence in you, they had no existence at all. You called and cried out loud and shattered my deafness. You were radiant and resplendent, you put to flight my blindness. You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now pant after you. I tasted you, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you. You touched me, and I am set on fire to attain the peace which is yours.”
Saint Augustine, The Confessions 10,38
🎯For Saint Augustine, the action of God in the heart of the Christian passes through the five senses. That’s why he opens his heart wide and exclaims: “You were radiant and resplendent, you put to flight my blindness.” It was the excess of God’s light that dispelled the darkness that enveloped him. He says “you called and you cried out loud”, we could say you shouted!, and you broke my deafness. God Himself enabled him as a hearer of His Word. He also expresses: “You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now pant after you.” He took a deep breath because from that moment on he only sighed for the love of God. He points out, “I tasted you, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you.”; He satisfied the desire of his heart. And finally, “ I tasted you, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you.”; The delicate touch of God’s love surrounds us with his tenderness and fills us with peace.
🎯With the restless heart of St. Augustine we could speak of the sensitivity of the organs of the heart: the eyes of the heart, the ears of the heart, the smell of the heart, the taste of the heart and the touch of the heart. It is in this sense that we want to invite you to travel the path of Advent as a pilgrimage from sensitivity, which brings us closer to the heart of Christmas, to the mystery of the Incarnation, to the encounter face to face and heart to heart, with the Word of the life made flesh.
Thus, during the first week of Advent we will 🎯open our eyes to a new epoch; to the time of waiting and hope. In this way Augustine’s experience will also be ours: “You were radiant and resplendent,” and “you put to flight my blindness.”
In the second week of Advent we will 🎯focus on listening to the Word in the silence of the desert, as proposed to us in the liturgy of the Word through the figure of John the Baptist, the voice that cries out in the desert. We will apply the stethoscope to the heart of God to listen to his heartbeat so that, as what Saint Augustine experienced, He “shattered my deafness.”
In the third week of Advent we will 🎯 apply to ourselves the fragrance of joy with the smell of the heart, that is, to smell the perfume of God’s mercy. In this way we will be able to exclaim with Saint Augustine: “You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now pant after you.”
In the fourth week of Advent we will 🎯taste the delights of the vocation, because the vocation is the dessert of the Christian life. Accompanied by two great teachers of vocational response, the Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph, we will rediscover the taste of our own vocation. Then that expression of Saint Augustine, I tasted You, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you will also have meaning for us. And finally, 🎯 in the middle of Christmas we will dedicate ourselves to feeling, that is, to experience the skin sensation, God’s embrace of humanity in newborn, the Emmanuel, the Prince of peace, who offers a peace that nothing or no one can take away from us. Then we can say with Saint Augustine “You touched me, and I am set on fire to attain the peace which is yours.”
Are we sensitive during Christmas? When we talk about sensitivity we usually think of a very emotional, extremely apprehensive and quite delicate person; who cries very easily. This concept of sensitivity does not help us to walk the path of Advent as a time of preparation for Christmas. So what is it all about?
Saint Augustine himself will help us enter more deeply into human sensitivity, since he was a man who not only had a restless heart, but was also very sensitive; even to tears. For him, sensitivity has to do with activating the five senses with vivacity: sight👁️, hearing👂🏼, smell👃🏼, taste👅 and touch🖐🏼. It is about energizing the five senses not only in their own sensory way – looking, hearing, smelling, tasting and feeling – but also something even more radical. It is all about connecting inwardly to God. These are the words of our Father Saint Augustine:
“Late have I loved you, beauty so old and so new: late have I loved you. And see, you were within and I was in the external world and sought you there, and in my unlovely state I plunged into those lovely created things which you made. You were with me, and I was not with you. The lovely things kept me far from you, though if they did not have their existence in you, they had no existence at all. You called and cried out loud and shattered my deafness. You were radiant and resplendent, you put to flight my blindness. You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now pant after you. I tasted you, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you. You touched me, and I am set on fire to attain the peace which is yours.”
Saint Augustine, The Confessions 10,38
🎯For Saint Augustine, the action of God in the heart of the Christian passes through the five senses. That’s why he opens his heart wide and exclaims: “You were radiant and resplendent, you put to flight my blindness.” It was the excess of God’s light that dispelled the darkness that enveloped him. He says “you called and you cried out loud”, we could say you shouted!, and you broke my deafness. God Himself enabled him as a hearer of His Word. He also expresses: “You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now pant after you.” He took a deep breath because from that moment on he only sighed for the love of God. He points out, “I tasted you, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you.”; He satisfied the desire of his heart. And finally, “ I tasted you, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you.”; The delicate touch of God’s love surrounds us with his tenderness and fills us with peace.
🎯With the restless heart of St. Augustine we could speak of the sensitivity of the organs of the heart: the eyes of the heart, the ears of the heart, the smell of the heart, the taste of the heart and the touch of the heart. It is in this sense that we want to invite you to travel the path of Advent as a pilgrimage from sensitivity, which brings us closer to the heart of Christmas, to the mystery of the Incarnation, to the encounter face to face and heart to heart, with the Word of the life made flesh.
Thus, during the first week of Advent we will 🎯open our eyes to a new epoch; to the time of waiting and hope. In this way Augustine’s experience will also be ours: “You were radiant and resplendent,” and “you put to flight my blindness.”
In the second week of Advent we will 🎯focus on listening to the Word in the silence of the desert, as proposed to us in the liturgy of the Word through the figure of John the Baptist, the voice that cries out in the desert. We will apply the stethoscope to the heart of God to listen to his heartbeat so that, as what Saint Augustine experienced, He “shattered my deafness.”
In the third week of Advent we will 🎯 apply to ourselves the fragrance of joy with the smell of the heart, that is, to smell the perfume of God’s mercy. In this way we will be able to exclaim with Saint Augustine: “You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now pant after you.”
In the fourth week of Advent we will 🎯taste the delights of the vocation, because the vocation is the dessert of the Christian life. Accompanied by two great teachers of vocational response, the Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph, we will rediscover the taste of our own vocation. Then that expression of Saint Augustine, I tasted You, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you will also have meaning for us. And finally, 🎯 in the middle of Christmas we will dedicate ourselves to feeling, that is, to experience the skin sensation, God’s embrace of humanity in newborn, the Emmanuel, the Prince of peace, who offers a peace that nothing or no one can take away from us. Then we can say with Saint Augustine “You touched me, and I am set on fire to attain the peace which is yours.”
